Winless in Dubai, USA Men Close But Not There Yet
Winless in Dubai, USA Men Close But Not There Yet
The USA Men’steam ended their Dubai weekend winless and in last place.
This is a new team with a new coach and they played like it, showing ability, and pushing their opposition, but they were unable to put in a full 14 minutes. This wasn't for lack of effort, it was mostly for lack of experience.
Losses of 28-12 to New Zealand and 42-20 to Fiji showed that the Eagles could score, but they could also be caught out of position. They were shut out by Spain but this Spanish side is quite good and made the final. In fact, those three Day One losses were against the tournament's #1, #2, and #4 finishers.
Rough Day One for USA Men in Dubai
On Day Two the Eagles were up against Uruguay, a team that isn't spectacular but hits hard and understands that a change of pace can do the job.
Uruguay opened the scoring with a support try on the edge. But the USA responded fast off a scrum, dragging in defenders for Pita Vi to score under the posts. Uruguay did well to control the ball and worked hard on defense, and responded with two tries and led 15-7 in the second half.
Peter Sio Jr. broke through but was halted at the tryline. Finally, though, Lucas Lacamp scored to make it 15-12, but poor connections and handling errors prevented them from scoring any more.
Newer players in the SVNS World Series play a bit too frantic. Thats one of the issues for this team. These players have been picked because they have ability and are good teammates, but at crucial moments they don't rest on that and play with relaxed confidence. That's understandable. They will get there.
In the 11th-place playoff against Ireland, Darrell Williams finally scored after both teams struggled to get going. Ireland answered and while David Still III got over the tryline, and that tied the game 12-12. But with time up Josh Kenny's try won it for Ireland.
“It was a brilliant learning experience," said new Head Coach Simon Amor. "Tough day at the office and didn’t quite get on the right end of all the close results. But given five guys making their debuts, the world series is a competitive place and right now is a great opportunity to learn. We showed on some occasions some really great stuff but made too many mistakes and that’s because of our inexperience as a new team. But I’m proud of how the boys stuck and kept scrapping on. We weren’t perfect but we kept on fighting.
“We’ve got a couple injuries to assess that hit us throughout the competition, and were down quite a few early on. But I was pleased with the resilience the guys showed in terms of not letting that affect them. Ultimately our one on one tackling is an area we need to improve upon if we want to be successful. And we want to eradicate some of those small handling errors. I’m pretty confident that the combinations will gel with a fair bit of work over the next week and going forward.”
So, 12th place. A need to work more together on defense; a need to relax with ball in hand; a need to understand that the work rate required in the SVNS World Series is far, far higher than anything they have experienced before.
