Rugby World Cup 7s

France A Surprise, Join USA, NZ, Australia In RWC 7s Women Semis

France A Surprise, Join USA, NZ, Australia In RWC 7s Women Semis

USA, France, New Zealand, and Australia make the Women's Rugby World Cup 7s top four on Friday in San Francisco.

Jul 21, 2018 by Alex Goff
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It's down to four teams in the Women's Rugby World Cup and there's one moderate upset along the way at AT&T Park in San Francisco.

Playing in front of a vocal and attention - and large - corwd, the USA had a couple of shaky moments but overall players very well in dispatching China and Russia to make the final four. In the quarterfinal against China, a soft early try made fans a little nervous, but Naya Tapper exposed China on the outside and some sterling work from Kate Zachary helped see the team through 38-7.

"We weren't nervous, we had plenty of time," said USA captain Nicole Heavirland. "We just had to get back to playing our game."


In the quarters against Russia, the Eagles ran out to a 21-5 lead thanks to some bruising runs from Jordan Gray and more aggressive play from Abby Gustaitis. Determined to meet the Russians at the point of contact, the USA dominated early. But a very poor refereeing decision led to a yellow card on Heavirland.

A Russian kick out of the 22 was covered by a USA player. She slid to the ground and, as the law says, she has to be allowed to get up before a player pounced on her. The Russian chaser didn't let her get up, but referee Joy Neville called a penalty against the USA. This was clearly the wrong call - it should have been a penalty against Russia, and Heavirland should have been forgiven for taking a tap assuming her team had the penalty.


Neville then added insult to poor decision-making by showing Heavirland yellow for delaying the game. Russia took advantage, scoring twice and making it a 21-19 game. But with Heavirland back on the pitch, the Eagles got the ball back and Ilona Maher blasted through for a superb try. Moments later Emba capped off some tough work by the forwards to finish off the game 33-17.

It was certainly the game plan to attack Russia physically, and it worked.

"Richie told me to bowl some players over," said Gray, who was immense. "And I did my best to do just that."

New Zealand was unstoppable, setting Portia Woodman free for four tries in wins against Mexico (57-0) and Ireland (45-0). Michael Blyde scored two against Mexico and three against Ireland as the Black Ferns moved the ball in a silky way and also were solid defensively.

Australia was almost as good, beating Papua New Guinea 38-5 and Spain 34-0. 


The big result was France against Canada. The French played some tenacious rugby and once against got a big game from Camille Grassineau. Lina Guerin scored two tries and France led 19-14 before Bianca Farella scored a nice team try down the sideline to tie it.

With time up, then, Caroline Drouin broke a tackle to break the Canadian hearts. France is into the semis.

"Canada is a very fast team, but we are strong," said Grassineau. "We hit them hard and we played strong together."

So Saturday there's all to play for. The USA plays New Zealand at 12:04 pm Pacific Time. France takes on Australia 22 minutes earlier at 11:42 am.

One other big upset happened on Friday, with Ireland edging England in the Round of 16. This knockout format is brutal, but the best four teams in the competition are the last four standings.