Tuesday’s Rugby News has the final Olympics sevens spot sealed, Los Pumas beating Les Bleus, a rugby league legend visiting the England camp and Nathan Grey batting away Steve Hansen’s barbs.
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Spain Seal Sevens Spot
Spain pipped Samoa 22-19 to win the repechage tournament, held in Monaco over the weekend, to become the 16th and final team to qualify for the Rio Olympics.
This means that Spain now joins Australia, Fiji, South Africa, Great Britain, United States, Argentina, France, Kenya, New Zealand, Japan and Brazil in the men’s event.
While information on the draw for the pools is incredibly thin on the ground, the official Twitter for the Aussie 7s says Australia will be in a pool South Africa, France and hosts Brazil.
Meanwhile, the final Olympic qualification tournament for the women’s sides is to be held in Dublin later this week, starting on the 26th. Presumably after the results are known for that, the pools for the Rio Olympics will be confirmed.
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Argentina Beat France
Argentina beat France 30-19 early Monday morning, in what was the final game of last weekend’s set of international fixtures.
Continuing their fine record of treating June internationals with respect, the French brought out a depleted side, with only three of players from their 31-21 home defeat to England in the Six Nations earlier this year, playing in this game.
To be fair to the French, the Top 14 is going through its final series, and Les Blues coach Guy Noves will probably be keen to bring the best of Clermont and Montpellier down to Argentina after those two teams were eliminated in the semi-finals.
By all accounts it was a tight game until prop Jefferson Poirot was sin-binned for a deliberate knockdown, after which Argentina closed out the game with 13 unanswered points, finishing the game up 3 tries to 1.
This makes it two wins from two for the Argies – a squad made up of Jaguares, a few locals and Tomas Cubelli – so far, who beat Italy 30-24 in the first weekend.
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Jones Invites Joey To Train
The English’s inability to coach themselves was highlighted again, after Eddie Jones has invited Australian rugby league legend Andrew ‘Joey’ Johns to train with the England squad on Monday.
As many papers are reporting, Johns dropped in to provide some tips to English playmakers Owen Farrell and George Ford, tips which Jones described as “invaluable lessons”.
“It’s just slight detail, the things that he’s saying are said in a different voice, in a different way that stimulates learning,” Jones said, “We’ve got two outstanding No. 10s in Owen Farrell and George Ford, and we want them to keep learning.”
“Guys like Andrew Johns, they did touch the ball 50 or 60 times in a game, they had to fix defenders, know when to drift, know when to be straight, know when to take a little unders line, how you use your eyes, where you position your hands.”
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Grey Bats Away Barbs
Wallabies defence coach Nathan Grey has more or less blown a giant raspberry in Steve Hansen’s direction in response to the All Blacks’ coach’s bullying barbs (reported yesterday).
“I couldn’t give a rats”, Grey said, “I’m so focused on what we need to do to prepare the players.
“In terms of manipulating the media, I don’t think you guys are that stupid to be manipulated,” Grey added, slam dunking the whole idea of reporting facts.
“It’s a matter of having a message and getting that message out there, whatever that is, that’s up to Eddie to do that. But we’re very focused on preparing the team to play, because that’s what we can control, we can’t control what’s written or printed. All we can control is our performance, you’ve got to let that do the talking.”
When Eddie Jones was asked about Hansen’s comments, he said, twinkle-in-eye, “I haven’t tried to win a war of words, I’m coach, you guys ask me questions, I give you answers.”
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