Only In Hand Grenades & Horse Shoes

This pundit was up early to watch U.S.A. take on Wales and the Canada Vs France contest.  The day started well enough by reading an overnight, 14 - 12 winning score line for the boys against Scotland but it seemed all down hill from there.  The U.S.A. used the blistering speed of Isles, strength of Barrett and a number of big American Samoan boys to lay the wood, big time on Wales.  The Americans have moved to final eight and take on N.Z.

Next it was Canada's turn and this pundit was stoked watching seven minutes of near perfect Sevens rugby for the boys to go up 21 - 0 at the half. From the get-go of the second half, things became diametrically reversed. It took two minutes for France to score their first try but then three others ensued, mostly due to errors and the odd missed defensive effort.  Turnovers at the re-start were brutal, with one solid, going forward effort of John Moonlight's resulting in a lost ruck.  There is no room to hide in Sevens and the players ceratinly know when a mistake occurs. After a fortuitous missed French conversion, to leave the score at 21 - 19 for Canada and about fifty seconds left, the ball came to Hearn and he saw a huge space downfield, banging the ball to buggery BUT the chase was poor, a tackle was missed and France had ears pinned for the eventual, final tally and 24 - 19 win.  A real heart-breaker for all.

Strangely, in the Pool, Fiji went 3 - 0 and Scotland, Canada and France went 1 - 2 but with a much smaller point differential, Scotland went through to cup play.  Canada starts against Zimbabwe, so we'll see if a resurrection, similar to Dubai can occur.  For the France game, it was a far better result than last week's shellacking at Dubai and I liked Moonlight, Duke, Douglas, Fuli and Hammond's work.