Wales beat Fiji 21-14 in the Cup quarter-finals at Murrayfield to mirror their achievements at Twickenham last weekend and reach the semi-finals of the main competition, climbing two places up the IRB World Sevens rankings in the process.
Jonathan Edwards’s side ended Fiji’s hopes of holding onto their World Series title for another year in a shock win which included tries for Rhodri McAtee, Aled Thomas and Tal Selley and three conversions for Dragons playmaker Thomas who finished the tounament in the top five points scorers.
A tired Wales later ended their tournament with a 28-0 defeat to eventual tournament and Series winners New Zealand but Coach Dai Rees is convinced Wales can go from strength to strength and regularly reach the knock-out stages of the Cup.
“The team has done Wales proud this weekend and last,” said Rees. “We are the only team outside of the IRB’s core Sevens teams to finish the season ranked within the top eight and we finished sixth which is an incredible achievement.
“We set out to reach the last eight three times this season but we have done that and a lot more with two semi-final places in these last two competitions. I was disappointed with the scoreline in the semi-final, but not the application. We broke New Zealand on a number of occasions but weren’t able to score. Nevertheless, the boys will have learned a lot from the experience.
“Our top four finishes mean we will be seeded top of our pool for the first two tournaments of next season in Dubai and George. The results are testament to the environment that has been created by our team management – the likes of Dai Jenkins the Team Manager, Gareth Baber, Assistant Coach and Huw Wiltshire, our Fitness Coach – and the boys themselves have put their heart and soul into these tournaments.”
On day one of the Scotland tournament, Wales Sevens defeated France 28-12 and Italy 43-0 to make it through to the quarters after a 21-14 loss to Samoa.
