Canada's women's sevens rugby team has gone 5-0 at the Hong Kong Sevens tournament to claim the championship Friday.
Mandy Marchak (Vancouver, BC) and her side followed their victory in Las Vegas last month against Netherlands with more hard work in Hong Kong and gained a deserved 28-14 victory over france with tries from Montreal's Ghislaine Landry (2) and Lethbridge native Ashley Patzer (2).
The women started their championship day by blanking Japan 31-0 followed by an explosive 64-0 win over Chinese Taipei. The winning continued with a 40-7 win over the Russians and then Canada booked an automatic spot into the finals by beating the USA 26-7.
Patzer was the top scorer in the tournament with 68 points while Landry had seven tries on the day and scored 60 points overall.
"It wasn't pretty but it was a win," said Marchak after the physical match against the French.
"I'm extremely proud of my team, we worked really hard for the last month so we really deserved this one. I feel this is the start of something great. Next it is Amsterdam, so here we come."
Coach John Tait felt the same about the championship and said he was impressed with his team's stamina toward the end.
“Although we won in the final, at that point of the day it was a bit of a war of attrition, so we couldn't show that big crowd how good we really were,” Tait said. “They really won through mental toughness. We didn't play that well in the final and we still dominated France.”
The women's tournament was played over just one day, meaning that Canada played five matches in less than 12 hours to nail home their success.
They started with a 31-0 win against Japan and followed that up with a 64-0 beating of Chinese Taipei and a 40-7 win against Russia in their pool.
They then scored a morale-boosting 26-5 win over rivals USA in the semi finals before taking on France in front of the giant crowd in the main stadium.
The French had beaten Hong Kong, Philippines, Netherlands and China to reach the final, but had no answer to Canada.
Sevens rugby will be an Olympic event at the 2016 Rio de Janiero games and Rugby Canada is part of the Canadian Olympic Committee. Unlike 15 a side rugby, which is played over 80 minutes, Sevens rugby features just seven players per side played over two seven minute halves, making for a fast paced, generally high scoring affair.
