Irish Rugby and Sevens

Men got to quarter finals after a 12-17 loss to Samoa and wins Spain and USA both 26-0. Lost to South Africa in quarters. Play GB next in 5th place playoffs

Women beat Spain 14-12, Brazil 26-12 and lost to Australia 43-7 before a 26-12 win over Fiji in quarters. play New Zealand in semis.

You can score a try

If you jump out of touch and tap the ball back on before you land

So we beat GB and lost to Samoa 24-12 in mens and the women lost to new zealand 41-0 and lost to USA 12-5

We're now 9th in mens series. 23 points gap above GB in 10th and 4 behind Australia and then USA, Argentina, Fiji, France all within 10 points

Women are 5th. level on points with France. 14 behind USA and Australia and 16 ahead of Fiji, GB.

Yeah unless women start to struggle and finish in the 6th/7th/8th places at a few tournaments and Fiji or Britain make finals then the spot is theres.

Would be huge for womens team to get a spot. Even more for sport than getting the mens team there

Really wish we could do more for 7s at a domestic level. plenty of longstanding tournaments. would be class if they turned the Kinsale, Connemara. few other places into a series for club teams.

I cant remember exactly how it went. but as with so much of governance/management of womens game. handled badly from all angles.

A series with existing tournaments and add a few more in other areas around country could be class. tie in decent music or anything else and draw good crowd. would be cool to see. Clifden, Kinsale, Dublin, Carrick, Athlone maybe 1/2 more venues

aIreland put down Canada 22-0 and South Africa 14-5 to top their group booking a quarter final against Australia.

I didn't see the match but it looks like Ireland took a 31-7 hammering against Australia. Ireland to play Great Britain in the 5th place playoff later.

Frustrating call by the ref at the very end, especially as he had just penalised Argentina for a similar offence moments before.

I thought they were seeded as in you can only have two top 8 sides per group?

IRELAND MEN’S SEVENS Squad (HSBC Hong Kong Sevens, Hong Kong Stadium, March 31 – April 2, 2023):

Jordan Conroy (Buccaneers RFC)

Sean Cribbin (Suttonians RFC)

Fergus Jemphrey (IQ Rugby)

Jack Kelly (Dublin University FC)

Hugo Lennox (Skerries RFC)

Matt McDonald (IQ Rugby)

Liam McNamara (IQ Rugby)

Harry McNulty (UCD RFC)(capt)

Chay Mullins (Galway Corinthians RFC/Connacht/IQ Rugby)

Dylan O’Grady (UCD RFC)

Mark Roche (Lansdowne FC)

Tom Roche (Lansdowne FC)

Andrew Smith (Clontarf FC/Leinster)

IRELAND WOMEN’S SEVENS Squad (HSBC Hong Kong Sevens, Hong Kong Stadium, March 31 – April 2, 2023):

Kathy Baker (Blackrock College RFC)

Claire Boles (Railway Union RFC)

Megan Burns (Blackrock College RFC)

Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe (Railway Union RFC)

Stacey Flood (Railway Union RFC)

Katie Heffernan (Railway Union RFC)

Eve Higgins (Railway Union RFC)

Erin King (Old Belvedere RFC)

Vicky Elmes Kinlan (Wicklow RFC)

Emily Lane (Blackrock College RFC)

Kate Farrell McCabe (Suttonians RFC)

Lucy Mulhall Wicklow RFC) (capt)

Béibhinn Parsons (Blackrock College RFC)

IRELAND SEVENS Schedule – Hong Kong Sevens:

Friday, 31st March

• Ireland Women v Fiji, 6.04am Irish time
• Ireland Men v South Africa, 8.04am Irish time
• Ireland Women v Australia, 10.28am Irish time

Saturday, 1st April

• Ireland Women v Brazil, 2.32am Irish time
• Ireland Men v Kenya, 4.28am Irish time
• Ireland Men v New Zealand, 8.49am Irish time

Sunday, 2nd April

• Play-off matches.

Damnit, got up to watch it then got a phonecall and forgot all about it. I suppose it's not so bad as they lost.

Women in the 5th place semi final against France.

The men are in a 9th place quarter final against Canada.

Two teams in the men's that you wouldn't expect to be playing for a lowly ninth.

The women were in a tough group.

Top 4 qualify (down to 5th if France is top 4).

The women should be aiming for this. If the last two events had been 5ths or 6ths instead of 8th we would almost be locked in for top 5 (with France top 4). Instead we have a 2 point lead over Fiji and a 4 point lead over GB going into the last event. Both Fiji and GB are in good form (having finished 3rd and 4th last time out).

There are 3 rounds left in the mens series. We are currently 8th on 91 points. I don't think we will catch South Africa who are 5th (on 101 points) while also overtaking Australia and Samoa.

After that theres a European qualifier (which has one qualifying team and one slot in an international repechange for the last slot).

Assuming we don't qualify from the world series it will be between us and GB for the European slot in the mens.

In the womens should we not qualify we should hope for GB to do well in the last world series event as it will make the European qualifier automatic if they and France aren't taking part.

We added losses to South Africa and USA to finish 15-16.

This could well be our worst result since we pulled together a contracted sevens squad.

Let's hope the women have a good weekend in Toulouse and wrap up qualification before the European games. Or if they don't let's hope it's GB who take the last spot so it should only be us Vs Spain really for the European games spot as nobody wants to go to the repêchage for the last spot. It's a pretty brutal high pressure qualification format outside the World Series.