The Springbok Women’s Sevens are one victory away from their HSBC SVNS 3 objective at The Sevens Stadium in Dubai after winning all three of their Pool A matches on Saturday in a commanding display of attacking rugby.
By doing so, they qualified for the tournament semifinals to be played on Sunday, and they will face Poland at 09:h28 (SA time), with a win over the Europeans securing not only a place in the finals, but qualification for the HSBS SVNS 2 series to be played in the next three months.
The three wins, over Mexico (61-0), Czechia (24-5) and Thailand (33-5) came in attractive fashion, with the pace of the SA side out wide a clear advantage.
Maria Tshiremba scored four tries in the opening win over Mexico, and fellow speedsters Nadine Roos, Ayanda Malinga and Patience Mokone also went around the defence with regular intervals.
Tshiremba laid down the marker in the opening match, dotting down three times before the halftime break and once shortly after with great use of her speed.
Mokone replaced her and dotted down twice as they romped away against a Mexican side that had no answers to the all-round attack from their opponents.
The match against Czechia started well, with Nadine Roos and Shiniqwa Lamprecht scoring good tries, but they lost focus when Asisipho Plaatjies was yellow-carded. The Eastern European side took advantage of their extra attacker and scored just before the break.
The second half remained tight, but a good effort by Tshiremba opened up the winning margin.
Against Thailand, the SA team conceded first as Laksina Nawakaew sold them a dummy to score the opening try. The response was swift, though, as Leigh Fortuin scored from the restart, running all of 80 meters to dot down. Vianca Boer and Zintle Mpupha also added second-half tries as the Springbok Women’s Sevens zoomed into a third win.