Commonwealth Games Rugby 7s Review

The Commonwealth Games (Gold Coast, Australia, 4^th-15^th April) are often seen as an under the radar sporting spectacle. Rugby was added in 1930 and a women’s rugby tournament was added for the first time this year.

This year it was an intriguing rugby sevens tournament featuring some of the top women’s (and men’s) teams in the world. The action kicked off on the 13^th April, with a flurry of games going right through the weekend until the medals matches on the 15^th April. In the Cup final, Australia and New Zealand went to overtime where New Zealand scored first in sudden death to take the first ever women’s Championship!

The tournament acted as as a somewhat warm-up for the Rugby Sevens World Cup (20-21^st July, San Francisco). England, Australia and New Zealand will all be in action in both tournaments. But it is also an important event in its own right.

Australia and New Zealand raced through pool play

Eight teams qualified for the women’s tournament, which featured two groups of four in the pool stages. Pool A featured: New Zealand, Canada, Kenya and South Africa. Pool B featured: Australia, England, Fiji and Wales. Teams in each pool played each other once, with the top two in each pool qualifying for the semi-finals. Australia faced off against Canada and put up 33 points to 7. In the other Cup semi-final New Zealand dispatched England 26-5.

While New Zealand took home the first ever Common Wealth Gold for women’s rugby there is still more rugby to look forward to this spring and summer. Teams head to Kitakyushu, Japan this weekend and then on to Langford, Canada and finish out the HSBC Sevens Series in Paris, France. As a result there is plenty of temptation to take the big odds with both Canada (20/1) and England (25/1) offering fairly decent value for an upset. Indeed, you can get even more value if you check out these latest betting offers for Australian bettors which can be used to bet on women’s rugby. The other teams odds are: Fiji 150/1, Wales 500/1, Kenya 500/1 and South Africa (all odds supplied by Bet365).