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Singapore Sevens: Home of the underdog

As the HSBC Sevens World Series enters the second half of the circuit, the usual suspects are atop the leader board.

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First placed South Africa have a healthy ten-point lead over New Zealand, who are jostling with Olympic champions Fiji who sit third.

Though these three Sevens superpowers often steal the headlines, it seems there is one leg none of the top sides look forward to – and that leg is Singapore.

That’s because the Singapore Sevens is the home of the underdog.

The tournament is an underdog itself, reintroduced as a World Series leg in 2016 after a ten-year hiatus.

Since making its return to the circuit, Singapore has quickly emerged as the leg where big names mean nothing. Just ask giant-killers Kenya and Canada.

Kenya and Canada have won the tournament in its last two iterations, the first Cup win for both countries. New Zealand haven’t made it past the quarter finals, and South Africa haven’t progressed past the semis.

In 2016 Kenya toppled the Fijians 30-7 in the Cup Final, while Canada beat the USA 26-19 the next year – in a matchup historically reserved for the Bowl or Plate – after shrugging off New Zealand and England in the knockout stages.

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The Singapore Sevens are back for 2018, and 16 more teams will be hoping for their own fairytale ending.

Perhaps it will be the gutsy Argentinians, who are searching for their first tournament win in close to a decade.

Or maybe the stern Samoans, still hoping to rediscover the form that saw them become World Series champions in 2009.

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If you want to find out in person, get along to the 2018 Singapore Sevens from April 28-29 at Singapore’s National Stadium.

Two-day passes start at $50SGD for adults and $25SGD for youths (4-18 years old).

TOURNAMENT DETAILS

Dates: April 28-29
Venue: National Stadium, Singapore
Tickets: http://bit.ly/2Diebbg
Official Website: http://www.singapore7s.sg/home/ 

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J
JW 3 hours ago
The revitalised Australians are pushing a Super Rugby revival

I’d have to get my head around it, but for simplicity and continuity sake, I’ll pose if we take your description and apply that it means a team like SA simply chooses to scrum and lineout more often, and perhaps take longer in doing so, then that would be a very obvious circumstance to have verified, but I have not seen anything like that. I mean we did agonize over scrums nearly taking a minute to set in that semi final, but that was two sides happy to play (at) the same game (/pace).


My assumption was it was rather a symptom of how they play, a combative tight contest results in more errors/scrums, kicking inclination and tall timber means more ball dead lineouts (playing for penalties?), if the game is '“slower” because of ‘legitimate’ factors, a low BIP is fairly irrelevant, you’re both still getting your bang for buck of a great contest, and those contests are very absorbing and energy zapping, which doesn’t align with your theory. You’re on the edge of your seat waiting to see one team get smash in the scrum, or if the other can secure good ball, just as you are waiting for a phase or two to build before pressure a ruck for a turnover etc. I’m sure they would loved a higher BIP if that was the symptom of their style, just as long as they got those rest breaks still.


But I could always have had the wrong perception of it being based on the fact I’ve only notice BIP improving when refs started stopping the clock (instead of berating the teams to hurryup), so the BIP obviously improves when doing that, but the game still looked to take as long, meaning that 1 or 2 minutes saved was always going to be largely ineffectual. It has also always appeared to me that what defines teams like SA is the amount of time the clock is stopped (even before refs tried to combat them by blowing the whistle more often) in their games, and therefor how long their games last. This is a stat/factor that I have seen analyzed and proven, but your articles have also highlighted the odd thing or two (scrum frequency dropping etc) that I would be very interested in a comprehensive analysis on effects of a test involving SA (compared to before), I certainly can’t remember any extra fatigue showing in their games last year after a raft of changes to stop scrums from being taken etc.

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