England Face Samoa in the Quarter Final
Having survived a late come back for a narrow victory against Tunisia in the morning, England comfortably beat kenya to win their group in the iRB Sevens World Cup. It was clear that against Kenya England had their 'big match' heads on as their game was characterised by very few unforced errors or missed tackles, something that could not be said for the earlier games against Hong Kong and Tunesia. As against Hong Kong, Josh Drauniniu, game of the bench in the match against Kenya and again showed his fluent running skills in broken filed. England are now in to the knockout stages of the tournament where there are no second chances. From RFU.com England 26 -7 Kenya England will face Samoa in the cup quarter final after a confident display against Kenya at the Rugby World Cup Sevens in Dubai. England had a shaky start this morning in their second pool match against Tunisia. But this evening they were back in fine form running over the line four times to seal the win. Kevin Barrett had England's opening try after an overthrown Kenyan lineout gave England possession. Ben Gollings added the conversion and England were 7-0 up after two minutes. Kenya answered back minutes later with their only try of the match. England's last try of the half came from an England scrum, Tom Varndell charging up the right wing from well in his own half. Gollings failed to convert taking the scores to 12-7. England came back to dominate further, with Isoa Damudamu scoring the first of two tries after quickstepping two defenders to slam down under the posts. Gollings converted. Damu was back at the restart powering through the Kenyan defence to head straight for the line. Gollings added the rest to take the final score to 26-7. Coach Ben Ryan said "This team is assembled for big games; this is what they do well and we didn't let them get into their stride and we suffocated them." Ben Gollings "Deep down we always knew we have a few more gears to go. We're a bit lackadaisical against Tunisia but tonight was a completely different story, we didn't miss one tackle." England face Samoa in the cup quarter final at 1.50pm local time, GMT +4. England: Isoa Damudamu (British Army/London Wasps), Rob Vickerman (Leeds Carnegie), Tom Varndell (Leicester Tigers), Ollie Phillips (Newcastle Falcons), Kevin Barrett (Exeter Chiefs), Ben Gollings (Gold Coast, Australia), Chris Cracknell (Exeter Chiefs) Replacements: Josh Drauniniu (Exeter Chiefs), Andy Vilk (Benetton Treviso) Tries: Barrett, Varndell, Damudamu (2) Conversions: Gollings (3) England results: Thursday March 5, 2009 England 43-5 Hong Kong Friday March 6, 2009 England 26-24 Tunisia England 26-7 Kenya Ends