England face auld enemy in quarter-finals
ENGLAND took on fierce rivals Scotland in the Wellington Sevens quarter-finals overnight in their quest to make it backto-back wins in the World Series.
Following their stunning victory in Cape Town in December, Simon Amor’s men travelled to New Zealand’s capital as the inform team and it showed on day one with three Pool wins from three.
They first put Papua New Guinea to the sword 40-0 and then went on to beat a battling Argentina (26-7) and Kenya (31-12).
Their perfect record saw them top Pool A and set up a quarter-final clash against the Scots, who beat Wales 31-7 to finish second behind the impressive Canadians in Pool D.
“We’ve been trying to build our performances through the day because it had been a while since we played in Cape Town,” said captain Tom Mitchell.
“I thought we did that with two decent wins over Argentina and Kenya.
“We know the Scots pretty well from training with them in the Team GB camp last summer. They were pretty average in their first two games but came good in the last one so I’m sure it’ll be a tough one.”
Taking on Papua New Guinea, the invited team of the tournament, was a nice introduction to the competition seven weeks after their triumph in South Africa and England were never troubled scoring six tries in total.
Richard de Carpentier, Mitchell, Charlie Hayter, Dan Bibby and James Rodwell all got over the line as well as try-scoring machine Dan Norton.
Their second encounter against Argentina was a lot closer and they had to work hard but scores from Mitchell, Norton, Ollie Lindsay-Hague and Alex Davis ensured they came out on top.
Keen to maintain their perfect record, England went out of the blocks fast against Kenya and scored three tries trough Norton, Mitchell and Bibby. Kenya got one back before the break but Davis and Lindsay-Hague wrapped things up in the second half.
Wales kicked things off with a 33-0 win over Russia but they came unstuck against Canada, 28-5.
Ethan Davies put the Welsh on the board but a brace each from Nathan Hirayama and Harry Jones had the Canadians home.
That set up a decider for second place against Scotland, who also beat Russia but lost to Canada.
Wales trailed after tries from Gavin Lowe and Mark Robertson and despite Owen Jenkins’ reply, Lowe’s second followed by one aech from James Fleming and Glenn Bryce sent Scotland through.