CANADA UNDEFEATED IN RUGBY HAT TRICK
The sun wasn’t the only thing gleaming Saturday at Westhills Stadium in the Canada Sevens, the fifth of six stops on the 2017 women’s HSBC World Series.
The host team was shining as well, not only with its 3-0 start, but also with the medal glow from Rio washing over the Langford facility as more than 3,000 rugby fans got their first chance to watch the Canadian team play in person since its bronze-medal performance in the 2016 Olympic Games.
If you don’t think that’s a big deal, consider that only three Canadian sides have medalled in a team sport at the Summer Olympics since Victoria players Doug Peden and Art and Chuck Chapman led Canada to silver in basketball at Berlin in 1936. Those teams are the national women’s soccer squad twice, with bronze at London 2012 and Rio 2016, and the sevens squad at Rio.
“It was a great feeling with the fans all here for us. There was a lot of energy going on with the crowd cheering. We take it all in, but we focus on playing the game,” said Canadian player Charity Williams, who scored two spectacular fieldlength tries Saturday.
The hosts did not disappoint by defeating Brazil 33-5, France 33-0 and Russia 24-10 in pool play. Canada will meet England in the quarter-finals today at 10:30 a.m. in a reprise of the Rio Olympics bronze-medal game.
The other quarter-final matchups feature Olympic-champion Australia against the U.S. at 10:52 a.m., France versus Ireland at 11:14 a.m. and Olympic silvermedallist New Zealand against Russia at 11:36 a.m.
The championship game is at 5:30 p.m.
“The support of the home crowd really lifted us up,” said Canadian player Julia Greenshields, who scored a couple of impressive tries.
“There is so much energy, in the team and externally,” added Canadian player Hannah Darling, about the home tournament.
That despite the disappointing Canadian fifth- and sixth-place finishes the last two years in the Canada Sevens at Westhills, and the fact no host team has ever won a women’s World Series tournament.
“The crowd is great and we are focusing its energy in the right way,” said Canadian coach John Tait. “[Despite the din], we are so focused on each other’s voices out there.”
It’s part of the process that begins a quadrennial leading to the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games, 2019 Lima Pan Am Games and 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics.
“We are building our depth to 2020,” said Tait.
Toward that goal, Caroline Crossley of Victoria, Greenshields from Sarnia, Ont., and Breanne Nicholas from Blenheim, Ont., have joined nine veterans from the 2016 Olympics bronze-medallist team on this weekend’s Canadian roster.
Even though she was not a part of the Rio roster, Greenshields said the reverberations from the Olympic medal are being felt by the Canadian program in this new quadrennial.
“The Olympics created a positive and confident team,” Greenshields said.
That spirit was on ample display Saturday.
“There is chemistry between us and it has been building since the season began,” said veteran Canadian player Bianca Farella, who on the opening day, scored two of the best tries of the tournament so far.
“We can’t deny there are nerves playing at home. This is one of the smaller venues on the World Series and the fans feel so close, plus they are our fans. It gives us a jolt of energy. But we also have to block that out and keep our attention to the parameters of the field.”
Today is when it counts most in the medal round. At stake are crucial World Series placing points as the season nears its close. The Kiwis lead the 2017 World Series championship standings with 76 points after the first four tournaments in Dubai, Sydney, Las Vegas and Kitakyushu, Japan. The final tournament will be June 24-25 in Clermont-Ferrand, France.
Australia is in second place with 66 points, Canada third with 64, Fiji fourth with 50 and Russia rounding out the top five with 46 points.
After a bad start in Dubai, Canada has rebounded for a good season with first place in Sydney, second place in Japan and third place in Las Vegas.
But nothing would be sweeter than a win at home today.
“We got everybody on the same page today and will be gunning for the Cup,” Williams said. SCRUM NOTES: 10-year national team veteran Ashley Steacy, who will retire at the end of the season, was presented with a framed Canada jersey in front of the main grandstand at the end of game action Saturday.