PNG impress at Asia Pacific women’s tourney

THE Papua New Guinea women’s sevens team returned to the country last week after a very impressive performance finishing second behind Kazakhstan at the Asia Pacific Women Sevens tournament held in Malaysia last week.
Kazakhstan were crowned the Asia Pacific women’s Sevens champions after they beating PNG 22-15 in the Cup final in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, East Malaysia.
The tournament attracted teams from Singapore, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Tonga, Kazakhstan, the Cook Islands and India.
On the first day of the competition, PNG topped the Group B standings with three convincing victories over Singapore 24-0, India 38-0 and Samoa 12-10, to qualify for the Cup semi-finals.
They made it through to the final after thrashing Singapore 54-0 in a one-sided affair.
The final against Kazakhstan was entertaining and tough with both teams trading tries in the first half before going into the break tied at 10 points apiece.
PNG, however, could not manage to keep up their defence and attack allowing Kazakhstan to claim title with a 22-10 victory.
The PNG women are having a three-week break before resuming  training for other international stints.
The PNG women’s sevens team coach John Larry thanked the president of the PNG Rugby Football Union, Richard Sapias, for giving them the opportunity to travel for the event.
He said that the women put on an impressive performance at the tournament.
Larry said the women had recorded their best performance yet despite going in as the underdogs.
The women will assemble and prepare for the Darwin Hottest Sevens tournament in January and the Pacific Games in Noumea, New Caledonia, next year.