Author: Benson Hendrix

According to American Rugby News’ most recent update, the site is going dark for the remainder of the month and plans to open up again, revamped and renewed for the sprint to the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.

American Rugby News’ editor Brian Lowe has also moved on from the Web site it appears, as he was listed in that story as the former ARN editor. In recent weeks he’s moved on from ARN to the new We Are Rugby Web site.

I’m looking forward to seeing what new changes come to ARN, as well as Brian’s new writing gig at We Are Rugby. And I hope to finally have a few new surprises going on around here just after the new year (would have had them up sooner, but life derailed me for a little bit)

– Benson

Just a little diversion for Rugby fans this evening, or whenever you end up reading this, A video showing some of the differences between Rugby and Soccer – you’ll notice all the flopping and ankle grabbing and cheap shots thrown in soccer against the hard hits and intense play of the rugby, I’m sure. 🙂

Feel free to use this as an open thread for the evening.

http://www.youtube.com/v/BQU34NzAqpg?fs=1&hl=en_US

The United States Eagles sevens rugby team ended the first round of the 2010-2011 IRB World Sevens Series rugby tournament with their heads held high in Dubai this weekend.  After going 2-1 in pool play the first day in the desert kingdom, the Eagles went into day two expecting a little more than they showed against some stiff competition – ending the day 0-2.  When the team left Dubai, they walked away with six points for the eight-tournament World Sevens Series, which moves on to South Africa next weekend.

The Eagles started the first day of tournament play in Pool B, facing off against Zimbabwe, Argentina and World Sevens Series champion favorites New Zealand.  By the end of the day the U.S. team finished Pool Play qualified for the Cup Championship (one of the trophies for teams in Pool Play that did not finish in first place) with a respectable 2-1 – beating Zimbabwe 28-12, and Argentina 24-19, and losing to New Zealand 31-7.

On Saturday the Eagles started the Cup Quarterfinals against a motivated Samoan sevens squad (also last year’s World Sevens Series champions) – this is where the wheels unfortunately started to come off of the bus, so to speak.  Team USA was unable to contain the former champion’s style of power rugby and the Samoans ran over the Eagles to the tune of 38-5, bumping the Eagles down into the tournament’s Plate competition.  Team USA will see Samoa again in South Africa’s Pool B next weekend.

After the loss to Samoa, Caravelli informed the team that he had seen less than he expected based on the previous day’s matches.

“We really didn’t play well in the first of two games and I told them a performance such as that against Samoa was not acceptable; they needed to be more physical. Although Samoa had raised their game, we had brought ours down,” Caravelli said.

In the Plate tournament’s semi-final match, the U.S. squared off with South Africa, fresh off of a 21-19 loss to Fiji, always one of the most exciting teams in any sevens tournament.  The South Africans hammered the final nail in the Eagles tournament coffin, beating the U.S. 24-10.

Former Miami Dolphins defensive back Miles Craigwell, making his first tournament start for the Eagles Sevens team, scored a great try in Dubai. According to U.S. coach Al Caravelli, “(Craigwell) made three great tackles against South Africa and showed that some of the football skills can be of great use in rugby.”

Craigwell joins Kyle Marshall, Zach Test and Nu’ese Punimata as former American Football players who have recently converted to rugby (although while at the University of Oregon, Test played wide receiver for the Ducks, and played rugby for the University of Oregon team).

Earlier this week, the International Rugby Board and the USA Sevens announced a new broadcast deal with NBC Sports here in the U.S.  NBC will broadcast eight hours of live coverage from the U.S. Sevens tournament in Las Vegas on Feb. 12 and 13.

NBC has previous experience in covering sevens rugby, having successfully covered the U.S. Collegiate Sevens championship earlier this year.  I hope that NBC selects the correct announce team (*ahem… ahem… right over here!*) who can explain rugby to the non-rugby fan as well as keep things exciting for the seasoned Olympic Rugby fan. 

It’s nice to see that the inclusion of Rugby in the 2016 Olympics, and that Administrators in the U.S. are taking advantage of this to help the sport grow in the U.S.

NBC Sports executive vice president Jon Miller said “Rugby Sevens is an exciting, fast-paced sport that is growing in global popularity, participation, and interest. NBC had the privilege of broadcasting the inaugural 2010 Rugby Sevens Collegiate Championship and is excited to expand its coverage of rugby by bringing the HSBC Sevens World Series to live network television for the first time.

A quick Tip O’ the Hat to my friend Kevin Hare for hooking me up with this info! 

The U.S. lost a19-17 heartbreaker to Georgia on Saturday in Tbilisi as the Eagles were unable to hold the Georgians out of the end zone through nine minutes of extra time in a hard fought and physical game.

 The U.S. forward pack, led by captain Todd Clever, would keep the host Georgians guessing at each scrum and lineout throughout much of the game, but the wear and tear of extra time finally got to the Eagles.

With extra time finally winding down and the U.S. clinging to a 17-12 lead, a knock on (fumbling) penalty against Georgia gave the U.S. the ball back deep in Eagle territory in overtime, the Eagles and Georgians packed down for what would be the last set piece of the game.

As quickly as the U.S. put the ball in the scrum, the Georgians stole it away and put the U.S. on their back foot before punching a score through to tie the game.  The after score conversion is all that was needed to steal the lead back as time expired.

U.S. head coach Eddie O’Sullivan said ““We had a great team performance and everyone gave 110% and definitely put their bodies on the line.  I’m very proud of how we played.” Sullivan followed up by stating that even though this match was a loss for the U.S., it was considered the best game of the Eagles’ November European Tour.

With this win, Georgia and the United States are guaranteed to switch positions in the next IRB rankings, expected next week.

Tomorrow’s test match for the United States Eagles against Georgia in Tbilisi will be a decent measuring stick for the Americans’ development during the current European Tour.  Coming off of a 25-0 loss against Scotland “A,” the Eagles will have their hands full against a Georgian team looking for a second-straight upset against North American teams. While the Georgians have developed a reputation for harsh play on the field, approaching, if not, thuggishness at times – they will be playing at home, where they have been impressive this year.

With their 22-15 upset victory over Canada, the resurgent Georgians have leapfrogged Tonga in the IRB rankings and at #17 are now one spot behind the United States.  While these two teams did not face off against each other in the 2010 Churchill Cup, the United States did beat the Georgians 31-13 in Denver the previous year.

A victory against the United States will move the Georgians one more rung up the international rankings, replacing the U.S.

Georgia has been an erratic team in recent games, while winning against Canada and Russia (a grudge match to be sure, given International geo-political nastiness between the two in recent years) in recent matches, they’ve lost to Namibia and Romania this year as well. An interesting fact for this match, Georgia is 13 of 15 when starting center Irakli Chkhikvadze has been in the starting lineup; and when starting fly-half Lasha Malaguradze has played, Georgia has won 17 of 21 matches.

At first glance, international experience also appears to be a weakness for the Eagles – Georgia forward pack have more international appearances than the entire United States’ starting 15.  With Georgia’s new coach, Richie Dixon, coaching only his second game for the team, it will be interesting to watch their composure as they are pressured.  And while the United States has less international test experience, at least eight of the starting 15 currently play professionally overseas.

For the United States this ends the team’s “European Tour” for 2010.  Unlike many of the other teams travelling throughout the continent, the United States does not have a regularly scheduled yearly tour of the rugby playing nations.  In order for the United States to get stronger, they need to be more diligent in planning more than a handful of international test matches a year.  (While Georgia has racked up many international test-level face-offs in calendar year 2010, the United States only has two)

The United States also needs to work on better ways to keep their team together longer to train together.  But these are points for an upcoming piece on rugby in the United States dissecting what the IRC (Internet Rugby Community) usually bitch about.

Last weekend I had the pleasure of watching the Scottish National Rugby team cross swords – or in this case, cleats – with the now #3 ranked South African Springboks. I was incredibly proud of my ancestors’ heritage when I saw that the Magic Thistles (that’s what you get when your national team doesn’t have a nickname, I just start making them up) were going to redeem themselves after a horrendous loss to New Zealand by holding off a late Springbok surge to upset South Africa 21-17 and deny the visitors their first Grand Slam (sweep of the Isles teams) in 50 years.

After this win, the Scots jumped up two spots to replace Ireland as the sixth-ranked team in the world, while Australia and South Africa once again traded the second and third world rankings once again.

Far from engaging in free-flowing, explosive rugby – which to give the hosts credit, they tried to do from time to time – Scotland scored their points the European way. Penalty kick, after kick, after kick, blah blah blah. Scottish fly-half Dan Parks scored all 21 points off of six penalty kicks and a surprise drop goal, while Springbok kicking machine Morne Steyn continued to add to his total points scored in international play with four penalty kicks.  South African replacement flanker Willem Alberts scored a late try to try and revitalize the visitors, but it turned out to be too little, too late.

This week we’ve seen the aftermath of this game, with a shaken (but not stirred – wokka wokka wokka!) South African team trying to rebound with a win against an English team that has already upset Australia and full of players looking to show that perhaps the top three ranked teams in the IRB should not all be based in the Southern Hemisphere.

Meanwhile the Scots receive what should be a little bit of a reprieve when they face off against the Samoans, fresh off a 26-13 loss to England in Twickenham. Scotland need to be careful that they don’t lose their focus against a dangerous Samoan team that’s looking to rack up its first win on the European continent since beating Italy 13-9 in 2001, and its first win ever against Scotland.

Romania and Uruguay will butt heads on Saturday in Bucharest with nothing less than the final opening at the 2011 Rugby World Cup at stake. The winner of this match will determine who will play the role of “sacrificial lamb” to Argentina, England, Scotland and even Georgia in Pool B of next year’s World Cup.

This match is the second of a series of two matches between these two teams for this last open slot in the world cup, earlier this month they met in Montevideo, Uruguay and fought to a 21-21 tie.  In the two previous times these teams have met (2008, 2009 – both in Bucharest) Romania walked away the winner, giving them what has to be more than a home-field advantage going into this game.

So far this year the highlight for the Uruguayans was a run through the South American Championships’ semi-final match, where they lost to the world’s #8 ranked team Argentina 38-0. They’ve also competed in the 2010 Churchill Cup in the United States, losing their three matches to Canada, France “A” squad, and then losing to Russia 38-19 in the Bowl Final match.

On the other side of the scrum, Romania has a record of six wins, zero losses and one tie in their 2011 Rugby World Cup qualifying matches.  They’ve also finished third in this year’s European Nations Cup, behind Georgia and Russia.

Should this game be tied at the end of regulation, the two teams will continue with a period of extra time, then a first-score-takes-all, “two men enter, one man leaves,” Thunderdome-esque sudden death overtime. If no one takes the lead after this, then there will be some kind of a kicking competition, followed by an ice dancing contest, a beer keg chugging contest, a “prettiest mascot” competition, and possibly a match of Tiddly-Winks to determine a winner. But by Buddha someone is going to walk off of that field a winner.

(And someone should tell Bud Selig to take notes, when you have a one-off important game… such as an “All-Star” game, one team needs to walk away the winner, especially if there are important ramifications for the winning side)

Recovering from their less than stellar performance in the Women’s Rugby World Cup earlier this summer, the Kazakhstan women’s rugby team won the first ever Asian Games Women’s Rugby Seven championship after beating the tournament’s heavily-favored team, and host country , China 17-14 at University Town Main Stadium, Guangzhou, China on Tuesday.

Kazakhstan’s team was made up of 11 of 12 players from the nation’s Women’s Rugby World Cup team earlier this year, while China benefitted from home-field advantage, sweeping through to the championship match without being scored on.  That streak ended four minutes in the first half as Irina Amossova scored the first try of the match.

China recovered and went into the half 7-5 leaders off of a Wang Qianli try and Fan Wenjuan conversion.  Instead of folding, the Kazakh’s traded the lead with the Chinese in the first part of the second half, until Anna Yakoleva scored the game winning try halfway through the second half.  The Chinese had a last-second scoring drive denied when they lost the ball after crossing the goal line.

(Note: for non-rugby readers, you have to not only cross the goal line with the ball, but also physically place the ball on the ground under control for a score to count. Hence the name used in American Football “Touchdown.”)

Curses, I was too slow on the email today to find out about the cool-as-hell live web feed from We Are Rugby covering the Atlantic Cup on Saturday – featuring the U.S., Canada and Jamaica.  However, if you want to check out the site and the other web casts they are showing (currently I’m watching the New South Wales Rugby League on their site) , visit them at

http://www.wearerugby.com/atlantic-cup-live-feed

And read some of their stories while y’all are over there.  After all, we’re all in this together!