CAPE TOWN – The Springbok Women’s Sevens know the importance of winning the World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series tournament, and the side won’t underestimate their opponents.
That is the view from Renfred Dazel’s charges’ senior player, Nadine Roos who will be the key for the side this weekend.
The tournament will take place at Markötter Stadium in Stellenbosch from 20-22 April.
Roos who plies her trade in Japan for Nagato Blue Angels says there’s been a great atmosphere at the camp ahead of their opening match.”Coming into camp seeing all the ladies smile and their energy levels high is amazing, you can see the hard work that has been going on in preparing for this challenger series,” said Roos.
“In an environment like this, it’s what you want to see before the big tournament like this where everyone is happy and all the energies are so high it’s good to witness.”
The winner of the women’s competition is set to secure Sevens World Series entry for the next season while the men’s competition winner will enter a four-team playoff at the HSBC London Sevens in May this year.
Roos says they have been studying all the teams to see their weaknesses.
“A challenger series is a different ball game compared to other tournaments we have played before, this one is tricky because it gives you a different challenge with different teams,” she said.
“The factor of rugby, the level of intensity it’s not changing, luckily for us, we played the world cup and Cape Town Sevens last year and Dubai Sevens which was also high in terms of level intensity.
“We basically built on what we’ve created there to implement things better for the challenger series ahead.”
Dazel side will be welcoming the co-captain Matrin Simmers who returns after missing out on the Cape Town Sevens due to injury.
The 26-year-old believes this year’s tournament will be more giving than last year, she says there’s a lot of teams to look out for.
“Looking at last year’s challenger series Poland lost in the final to Japan, and China is not a bad team as well, we have played against them at the world cup. They also have numeric fixtures of the invitational side on the world series,” she said.
“But I think for us everyone is a threat, we are not going with the minds of targeting one team but all – we will focus on our games, take them day by day – one game at a time.”
World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series pools:
A: Poland, Colombia, Hong Kong China, Paraguay
B: South Africa, Madagascar, Mexico, Czechia
C: China, Belgium, Papua New Guinea, Thailand
The Springbok Women’s Sevens pool fixtures:
Thursday 20 April
09h22: Czechia
12h38: Mexico
Friday 21 April
11h10: Madagascar
