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Blitzboks blown away by Kiwis in Sydney final

rugby29 January 2023 10:32
By:Brenden Nel
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It was a game too far for the Springbok Sevens team as they went down tamely 38-0 to New Zealand to lose the Sydney Sevens final on Sunday morning.

While they were full of fire when they beat Fiji in the semifinal, it was a different story in the final as they looked tired and were bossed at the breakdowns by the Kiwi side, fell off tackles and just generally looked listless after a long weekend in the tournament.

It was the first time in living memory that they went scoreless in a game against their arch-rivals and even the most staunchest Blitzbok supporter will have to admit there was only one team in the contest.

Add to this fumbles and handling errors, just general lack of pace against a team that was just the opposite and this was a one-way final in every sense of the word.

There is no sugarcoating this, the loss was probably the worst in an era of Blitzbok rugby where they failed to fire a shot and weren’t in the contest at any given time.

Luckily it was the final and not in the group stages, and the Blitzboks will still collect a bunch of points from the tournament and will have to forget about the unanswered six tries as quickly as possible before they head to the next tournament in Los Angeles.

For the record, Joe Webber was the well-deserved player of the final and scored New Zealand’s second try. The others on the scoreboard were Roderick Solo, Sam Dickson, Akuila Rokolisoa, Amanaki Nicole and Ngahori McGarvey-Black.

The All Blacks now lead the series with 85 points, nine ahead of South Africa on 76.

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