Te Awamutu Sports win Suburbs Sevens
Coach credits team culture and players’ mindset for victory
Te Awamutu Sports came away victorious at the Suburbs Sevens, their first official sevens tournament of 2022, at Flagstaff Park on Saturday. The Travis Church, Sam Gibbens and Sean O’Connor-coached side powered through to the final defeating Hamilton Old Boys to take the win.
They went through their pool games unbeaten and into the knockout final where they came out on top with Latrell Smiler Ah-Kiong scoring the winning try after the final hooter.
“Our young group have been working hard together. I believe our success at Suburbs Sevens was built on the back of our team culture,” says Church. “Our young men were selfless and pushed through some mental and physical pain barriers and we managed to achieve something that our club hasn’t done for a long, long time. So, we are happy with the progress but also know we can improve on these performances.”
The squad had a practice run at the Te Awamutu Sports Twilight Sevens tournament the week before which prepared and gave them confidence for the Suburbs competition.
“It was a good start to the sevens season for the club. The boys started training six weeks ago and we set some goals for our sevens season,” says Gibbens, a former Manu Samoan sevens rep.
“Our mindset was to turn up to every training with clearly defined purpose and goals, focus on intention, keep learning and to have fun.
“We had a squad of 14 for the tourney with, Latrell, our captain, leading the boys well throughout the day. He was well supported by a couple of standout performances by powerful forward David Langi, Zealin Prime, Stacey Daniels, Niah ChurchJones, Manahi Goulton and Sala Kuresa.”
Te Awamutu Sports now look to theHinuera tournament at Wealleans Park on October 29.