The World Club 7s is back this weekend and taking
over Twickenham on 16th and 17th August.
The likes of Auckland, Blue Bulls, Buenos Aires,
Cardiff Blues, DHL Western Province, Kuban Krasnodar, New York City 7s, NSW Waratahs, RC Enisei, Seattle and Premiership 7s
Series champions, Gloucester and runners up Harlequins, will be joining the
best from around the globe to showcase their skills and vie for victory in this
intense and thrilling tournament.
In the lead up, I spoke with Auckland 7s Captain
Tutu Tairea.
“It’s a real honour…I do what I can do to help the
boys out and help us get to where we want to be… it’s helped me grow as a
person as well.”
“We expect ourselves to go as high as we can, we’ll
do our best.”
“For us we’ll probably take it one game at a time
and our goal will be to make the quarter-finals and then we’ll pretty much go
from there and hopefully get to the finals.”
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Tutu Tairea and Charlie Walker at the World Clubs 7s 2013
Photo - David Rogers/Getty Images
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Memories of the inaugural World Club 7s last year
are still fresh and delivering a powerful, punchy performance is absolutely on
the agenda, especially with some new guys to look out for;
“It was a good experience...we missed out just in
that final which was pretty hard to take but they’re all pretty good sides so
we’re looking to come over and hopefully do one better.”
“Coming over to the UK and seeing people supporting
all teams - and we get a few UK supporting the Auckland players as well - so it
was good.”
“We’ve got two young boys coming in … Akira Loane
just coming off the Commonwealth Games, so it should be pretty good … Stacey, (Stacey Ili) another young talent coming through, it’ll
be pretty exciting once we get over there.”
So how do the teams acclimatise, with jetlag being
a fierce factor which is bound to take its toll? Well Tutu was sure it wouldn’t impact on
their performance;
“On the
first day, we try to get the boys to stay up as long as possible…it takes us a
couple of days to get used to the time difference.”
Out of interest I asked Tutu how many people
including backroom staff, they typically bring over;
“17/18 including coaches, physio’s. Physio’s are the main one for us, just to
keep the boy’s bodies up, making sure we’re giving them the right foods in
preparation for the tournament.”
The physical demands of rugby 7’s are unique, so
what attributes does Tutu think make a great 7s player? Well with factors such as agility, speed,
strength and overall versatility being key, fitness is the sure winner in
Tutu’s books;
“If it came down to one thing, I would have to say
fitness. There’s a lot of running and at the end of the day, it comes down to
those finals and you need that extra bit of air to get you through and the
mental side of it as well.”
And there’s one person in particular Tutu mentioned
he admired and feared most on the international stage;
“I think the one who’s going well at the moment is
Mikkelson, he’s an all-rounder, works hard off the balls and shows what he’s
got – especially on the international stage.”
Rugby 7s is going from strength to strength, with
evident excitement and popularity surrounding the trysts at the Commonwealth
Games 2014 in Glasgow. And as Tutu
mentioned;
“It’s a good
stepping stone for young players coming through, especially with the Olympics
coming along, they’ve got their goal and want to make the Olympics. This
tournament will certainly help them want to go one further”
So looking ahead to the Olympics in Rio 2016, tournaments like the World Club 7s are a perfect platform to start preparing the stars of the future in what can only be described as a challenging environment with mouth-watering fixtures.
Roll on the World Club 7s!