Ratu Ganilau Park

Tunuloa

A few months back, I witnessed the issuance of Small Micro Enterprises grants to beneficiaries at Ratu Ganilau Park, Savusavu.

While leisurely observing the crowd enthusiasm', I could see hordes of multitudes filing up the unfinished ‘pavilion. Although, it was covered with yellow ribbon like warnings the pavilion was filled to capacity.

Then an announcement soon came through the high pitched speakers that if people do sit there, it will soon collapse. The crowd, jumped, leaped, slinked, and

Most fans of Fiji Airways Fiji 7s team will be angry that we lost again to South Africa in the Cape Town 7s quarter final and some will be quick to write off our team.

I believe our boys performed well and they would have silenced the home crowd if they had concentrated more and did the basics right.

It is time for Coach Baber to bring in some big boys or get the current team to go on a ball and all tackle course, which was one thing that was driven into our Fiji 7s teams a couple of years ago.

It is good for the team to take one game at a time, but did they plan and set out the path to follow to reach the Cape Town 7s Cup final?

The Coach of the Canada 7s team already had that in mind when he was interviewed after his team shut off our boys in Pool play, when he replied, “We don't want to meet South Africa in the quarter final.” Despite losing to Canada and being second in its pool, our boys performed well to be third in the overall points table with 28 points, while New Zealand lead with 41 points, followed by South Africa on 39 points.

Had Fiji won and topped their pool, our boys would have had an easy pathway to the Cup final and would have registered their first tournament win.

But, this is all wishful thinking now and we all hope that Coach Baber and the Fiji 7s team will sit and watch the replays of all their games in the last two legs and work on all the basics that need to be improved on.

Our boys are just magic when they strut their stuff on full concentration mode, but it is when they lack concentration and lose the ball is where they pay the price by losing the game.

Vinaka boys, you are a champion team and we all hope you will learn from your mistakes in the last two tournaments and win one or both of the next two legs.

Go Fiji go.