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Watch: Player of the Final Filipe Sauturaga’s crucial score in Dubai

Filipe Sauturaga of Fiji scores a try during the pool match between Fiji and New Zealand on day one of the HSBC SVNS at The Sevens Stadium on November 30, 2024 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (Photo by Christopher Pike/Getty Images)

Fiji made history last weekend at the Dubai Sevens as they brought an end to their long-lasting title drought on the HSBC SVNS Series. In an intriguing Cup Final against giant-slayers Spain, the traditional sevens heavyweights returned to the top by pulling away to win 19-5 on Sunday.

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Olympic silver medallist Filipe Sauturaga received Player of the Final honours after the team’s unforgettable triumph at The Sevens Stadium. While it wasn’t a perfect performance from the 30-year-old, Sauturaga was able to have a game-changing impact in the big dance.

Fiji beat Spain in pool play to kick off their 2024/25 season, and they backed that up with a 42-20 demolition of the USA and a nine-point win over New Zealand. After clinching a dramatic quarter-final victory 19-17 against France, the Fijians had their best match of the weekend.

In the semi-finals against last season’s League Winners Argentina, six different players scored tries for Fiji in their statement 43-21 win. Marcos Moneta and Luciano Gonzalez scored tries inside the last two minutes for Argentina to reduce the deficit from a frighteningly large margin.

The Fijians followed that up with a hard-fought win over Spain in the big one. Espana had beaten the All Blacks Sevens once in pool play and again in the semi-finals, and they proved to be a tough opponent for the eventual champions in the battle for Cup Final glory.

Captain Pol Pla opened the scoring for Spain in the second minute, but it was all the Fijians from there in terms of points, which included Sauturaga’s try. Sauturaga, Jeremaia Matana and Ikikimi Vunaki all contributed five-pointers as the Fijians ran away towards silverware.

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Sauturaga also added a conversion, with Iowane Teba also converting an effort later on. It wasn’t all smooth sailing for the Player of the Final, with Sauturaga missing a couple of key tackles and another shot at goal.

But it was still the type of performance that warranted recognition.

In the women’s decider, former captain Charlotte Caslick was named the best on ground after a standout performance in a thriller against New Zealand. Caslick didn’t score a try but was front-and-centre as the Aussies dominated possession and controlled the match during the first half.

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Caslick missed a tackle attempt on Jorja Miller which saw the World Rugby Sevens Player of the Year nominee score the Black Ferns Sevens’ opener. It was a tense battle all the way through which was ultimately decided by Maddison Levi’s 15th try of the weekend.

With that effort, Levi set a new record for the number of tries scored by a woman in a single SVNS Series event. It’s not difficult to understand why Levi was recently crowned the world’s best female sevens player, boasting an incredible and fascinating try-scoring ability.

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“We just love the vibe of playing here and we love the weather, it’s a dry field, and I think it just really suits the way we like to play,” Caslick said on the RugbyPass TV broadcast post-game.

“Every year we roll out more and more young girls and that shows the depth of our program. I think the reason we do so well here is the fact that our program is so strong.”

The Aussie women’s side has been drawn in the mighty-tough pool for this weekend’s SVNS Series stop in Cape Town. Australia will take on Olympic silver medallists Canada and Brazil, with those two sides failing to make a memorable impact during the season-opener in Dubai.

Fiji will look to back up their ascent to champions status at the Dubai Sevens against Great Britain and Uruguay in Pool A in the men’s draw. Duba runners-up Spain will come up against Australia and Kenya as they look to maintain their high level of competition.

The SVNS Series leg in Cape Town will look a bit different with the 12 women’s and men’s sides split across four pools instead of three. With each team pitted against two other sides in pool play, only the top side will progress through to the semi-finals.

Catch up on the action from the HSBC SVNS Series live on RugbyPass TV, which you can sign up for HERE.

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J
JW 1 hour ago
'Matches between Les Bleus and the All Blacks are rarely for the faint-hearted.'

Well a) poor French results doesn’t seem to effect the situation much. In fact one of the reasons given for this selection policy is that the French don’t tune in for foreign rugby content on the other side of the world, at a time when theyre not having their vino. So who would know the results? And b) this is the crux of the matter, they are legally abided to play them as part of WRs tier 1 reciprocal tours programme. The only real choice for the SH team is to treat it the same, which is fine when teams are happy to do that, but the AB’s have a totally anthesis policy/mentality so would never use the games in the same way.


So alligned with b) the only real option is to complain to those in control. I suspect that’s why weve seen France reneging on the practice, and you can only be left to think that if they hadn’t reneged, WR would have done something more drastic about it. Which of course would mean not just telling them to bugger off when they want to tour, it’s no one playing them (from t1 at least) at all (assuming they have no interest in scheduling match’s outside the windows, like Ireland and NZ are doing).


Then of course that means no involvement of France in the Nations Championship. Which means they are automatically the last ranked team in 6N to qualify, so the actual worst team in 6N gets to compete in it, making a mockery of the promotion and relegation WR wanted to happen between T1 and T2 for qualifying purposes. Yup, b) is just something nobody wants to happen. Well done FFR and LNR for making the tour work instead (how well is yet to be seen).

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