Unbeaten Springbok Sevens charge into Vancouver semifinals after Pool A sweep

The Springbok Sevens team secured yet another semifinal in the HSBC SVNS series by claiming top honours in Pool A at the Vancouver leg at BC Place on day one of the tournament.

They will face Australia at 22:33 (SA time) on Sunday in the first semifinal of the HSBC SVNS Vancouver, while Fiji and Spain will contest the second semifinal.

South Africa outplayed Great Britain (21-5), Spain (28-7), and New Zealand (17-12) at BC Place to finish top of their pool. They have contested semifinals in Cape Town, Singapore, and Perth in the previous three events, winning at home and in Australia last month.

Good defence laid the foundation for the success of the first day; they missed very few one-on-one tackles, kept their discipline, and outworked their opponents.

They were a bit slow out of the blocks in their first match, conceding a couple of penalties at the breakdown, but once Ronald Brown made a break to score the opening try, more fluency on attack followed. Brown's opener was the only scoring in the first half. Team GB scored first in the second half, but the SA side upped the tempo with several bench players making an impact, such as Ryan Oosthuizen, who—alongside Shilton van Wyk—scored the second-half tries.

Against Spain, it was again a matter of patience. The Spaniards were full of running after a confidence-boosting win over New Zealand in their first game. Brown again opened the scoring as he darted around the blind side from a scrum in the only points of an evenly contested first half.

The second half belonged to South Africa as they tested and overcame the Spanish defence. Sebastiaan Jobb raced in from 70 meters following a great break, and soon after, Shilton van Wyk dotted down after another good attacking spell. Tristan Leyds scored the fourth try and converted, before Spain scored in the last play of the match.

A great start against New Zealand sealed the deal for the Blitzboks. Impi Visser scored after an impressive long-range effort by the skipper, and Shilton van Wyk followed soon after to extend the lead. A third try by Siviwe Soyizwapi late in the first half pushed the lead to 17 points.

New Zealand, needing to win the match to stay in the tournament, rallied well in the second half, scoring twice, but some good turnovers by Selvyn Davids and Dewald Human eased the pressure and allowed the Blitzboks to finish the day unbeaten.