Springbok Women’s Sevens are raring to go in Tunisia – Delport

The Springbok Women’s Sevens’ return to the international stage is not only welcomed by Paul Delport, but also the more experienced players, and added to that, there is massive excitement amongst the younger squad members who will be involved in international sevens rugby for the first time.

That was the message from the team, which was named on Monday evening, as they embarked on the journey from South Africa to Tunisia via Dubai, for the Rugby Africa Women's Sevens tournament that takes place this weekend.

“We are ready for this and have been for a while,” said Delport.

“It has been more than two years since the HSBC Cape Town Sevens (in 2019), where we last played and frankly, we are ready for this return.”

The squad completed their preparation for the tournament – where nine countries will compete for the continental title – in Pretoria and Delport was pleased with the fine-tuning and goodwill they encountered.

“We were able to have some training sessions with the Tuks Women's team, and I want to thank their coach, Riaan van der Merwe, for the opportunity,” he said.

“Added to the work done in specific areas of play, I believe we have ticked the boxes we will need to be successful.”

Delport and his players and management were invited to Loftus Versfeld as well, where they were hosted by the Blue Bulls Rugby Union on Saturday and introduced to the crowd prior to the Vodacom United Rugby Championship match between the Vodacom Bulls and Benetton.

“That was much appreciated and added to the realities that we are on the big stage again. We need to bounce back quickly and make sure we play to our standards,” added Delport.

South Africa will face Senegal and Zimbabwe in their pool on the opening day, and should they manage to clinch another Rugby Africa Sevens Cup, the reward will be an entry into the Commonwealth Games.

“That has been our focus since we started in January, and we slowly progressed to a level where I can say we are boarding our flight with confidence about our abilities and chances to win the tournament,” said Delport.

“We are not getting ahead of ourselves, but we have the knowledge that we trained hard and did put in the work. Now we need to go and execute.”