The Springbok Sevens ‘A’ side finished the Rugby Africa Sevens Series played at Labourdonnais Sports Grounds in Mauritius in second place on Sunday, with the overall result handing Uganda and Madagascar their passage to contest the World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series for 2025.
The South Africans were invited to participate in the tournament on short notice after one of the original contestants pulled out, and despite their short preparation time and many new players in the squad, they applied themselves well.
The series was played over two weekends, with the A-side placing third in the first tournament and second in the final event on Sunday. On both occasions they were pipped by Uganda, 12-0 in the semifinals of the first tournament and 20-17 in Sunday’s final.
Although there were some injuries to key players, such as Jaiden Baron, David Brits, James Murphy and Jayden Nell, Springbok Sevens High-Performance Manager Marius Schoeman said they were pleased with the outcomes over the last two weeks.
“It is never nice to lose any player due to injury and we did finish the tournament with nine available players, but that is part of the game,” said Schoeman.
“We came here on short notice, but with a clear objective and that was to deliver good performances and expose our next level of players. We managed to blood a number of new players and their response to tournament pressures were very valuable for us.
“We had a good look at how they responded to pressure, playing a lot of matches in a short space of time and how they responded to our system and structures.”
Schoeman congratulated Uganda and Madagascar for qualifying for the Challenger Series: “We want to have a strong contingent of African sides being competitive on the international stage and those two showed that they can give a good account of themselves.”
Sebastiaan Jobb was named as the MVP Backline Player for the series.
Results – second tournament:
Final: Uganda 20, SA Sevens ‘A’ 17
Semifinal: SA Sevens ‘A’ 36, Madagascar 14
Quarterfinal: SA Sevens ‘A’ 27, Burkina Faso 5
Pool: SA Sevens ‘A’ 24, Zimbabwe 12; SA Sevens ‘A’ 43, Mauritius 0; SA Sevens ‘A’ 33, Nigeria 0