Back-to-back wins cause to celebrate
After months of training against each other, they couldn’t hide their joy at beating Australia twice, writes David Long.
Never mind the two wins, the smiles on the face Stacey Fluhler and other the Black Ferns Sevens players, gave everything away about what this series against Australia means.
The team are playing their rivals from across the Tasman in six games over three days in Auckland and after splitting the victories on Friday, with that defeat being the first time they’d lost to Australia since 2018, they won both games at Eden Park yesterday.
They won the first game 26-12, with Portia Woodman, Michaela Blyde, Ruby Tui, Gayle Broughton all scoring tries.
The second, which took place after the Blues beat the Waratahs 48-21 in their Super Rugby transTasman encounter, was 15-12 victory but a tougher battle for the Black Ferns Sevens, with Australia’s Evania Pelite scoring in the first minute. Demi Hayes scored Australia’s second try a couple of minutes later.
New Zealand barely got out of their half over the first seven minutes and had the same problem at the start of the second period, even with Pelite in the sin-bin. Later in the half, Australia had two more players in the bin and the Ferns quickly made that advantage count with a try by Portia Woodman.
With two minutes left, Blyde went in, but the missed conversion left New Zealand down 12-10, then after the hooter sounded Blyde was in again for the match winner.
The series wraps up with two games at Orakei Domaintoday, and while for some fringe players in the Black Ferns Sevens squad this series will determine whether they’ll go to the Tokyo Olympics, for the more experienced players, there’s the joy of at last going up against another team again, after a gap of 473 days.
‘‘It’s been so cool playing someone other than our own teammates,’’ Fluhler told Sunday StarTimes. ‘‘Smashing each other, mentally you can get into a bit differently... we all know at the end of the day it’s our last trial for the Olympics.’’
Even without any tournaments to play in, as the World Rugby Sevens Series went into hibernation because of the pandemic, it didn’t stop the Black Ferns Sevens squad from training.
But you can only achieve so much with intrasquad games and as preparation for the Games these games are invaluable.
‘‘It’s absolutely amazing,’’ Fluhler said. ‘‘We’ve been waiting for this for a long time, just to get some different pictures.
‘‘We’re really good at playing against each other, but we know we play very differently on the world stage.
‘‘So to play someone else, who’ll attack and defend differently is only going to make us stronger moving forward.
‘‘You can definitely tell we’re two of the strongest countries in
the world going at it and it’s been a good challenge for both of us.’’
This series marks a big step forward in preparation for the Olympics and it gives the Black Ferns Sevens coaches Allan Bunting and Cory Sweeney, as well as the players, a good indication of where the team is.
The team will play in a soon to
be announced tournament in Australia next month, with the squad for the Olympics being named on June 30.
‘‘We know we’re not where we need to be, but right now it’s where we are,’’ Fluhler said. ‘‘We’ll get better, we’ll improve, and we’ll learn from these games. We know that other countries are playing
around the world, so first things first, get through these games, take those learnings, go back home and start training for the big one.’’
Last December, while recovering from an injury, Fluhler teamed up with former All Black Liam Messam to organise the Toa 10s rugby tournament at Hautapu Rugby Club in Cambridge, where
teams representing their iwi were able to battle it out in the inaugural competition.
‘‘It was awesome and we have a huge passion for helping our Ma¯ ori whanau get into sport and go away from the other things we usually grow up with.
‘‘So it’s a good opportunity for our iwi, our people to get together,
have fun with your whanau and play the sport we all love most.
‘‘We only had about six different iwi there last time, but the ultimate goal is to make it one of the biggest tournaments around the world for Ma¯ ori people’’ she said.
‘‘We’ll see where it goes . . . there is a lot of planning going on behind the scenes.’’