Australia punished a poor Blitzboks performance with a 29-22 victory in the Cup quarter-finals of the London Sevens on Sunday.
The Blitzboks, aside from a brief period in the first half, were never in the game and were dominated by the physically superior Australians, especially at the breakdown.
Neil Powell’s men missed the opportunity to secure Olympic qualification and will now play either New Zealand or France in the fifth-place semi-final at 3:04pm.
The Blitzboks got off to the worse possible start as Australia won the ball back off the kick off, and some poor defence allowed Henry Hutchinson to canter through untouched.
Australia extended their lead a minute later when they won a counter-ruck and a couple of phases later Joe Pincus muscled over the line.
Siviwe Soyizwapi then sped over in the corner after a wonderful floated pass from Justin Geduld to get the Blitzboks back into the match
Geduld then took advantage of some sloppy play from the Australians, and went over himself to level matters at 12-12 just before the break. But the Australians got reward when Matthew Hood scored to make it 19-12 at half-time.
It was 29-12 shortly into the second half as Hutchinson scored his second, before Ben O’Donnell added a fifth try, leaving the Blitzboks with a mission to get back into the game again.
Muller du Plessis and JC Pretorius both went over late on, but it meant little as it was all too late.
Photo: @Blitzboks/Twitter
