Baby Blacks start with big win

The Baby Blacks have humiliated Japan with a 67-0 win, making a strong start to their title defence at the World Rugby under-20 Championship in France.

New Zealand scored 11 tries in Narbonne yesterday as their power and pace proved too much for a Japanese team which was returning to the top tier of the championship after winning the second division last year.

New Zealand’s support play was outstanding as their runners constantly made inroads on the fragile Japan defence. The outside backs had a field day with big centre Bailyn Sullivan a huge metre-eater. He scored the solo try of the day, taking a kick-off in the 21st minute and running most of the field for an outstanding try.

Wings Leicester Faingaanuku and Jamie Spowat benefited, with five tries between them.

‘‘We will be very happy with that,’’ New Zea- land captain Tom Christie said after the win. ‘‘We will review it but on the whole I’m really happy.’’

Christie felt Japan had given his side a challenge at the breakdown that would be good moving forward, but he was still thrilled with the drive and skills of his own players.

‘‘Japan really challenged us. Maybe the score doesn’t reflect that but they competed hard at the breakdown and their maul was hard to stop. We’ll go back to the drawing board and have a look at the details and what we want to work on, and focus on us,’’ he said. New Zealand 67 (Will Tucker, Leicester Faingaanuku 2, Bailyn Sullivan, Vilimoni Koroi, Xavier Roe, Tom Christie, John Akauola-Laula, Jamie Spowat 3 tries; Kaleb Trask 5 con, Harry Plummer con) Japan 0. HT: 38-0.