THE Fiji Airways Fijiana 7s team is determined to finish strong as they prepare for the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series season finale at the Dignity Health Sports Park in Los Angeles this weekend.
Head coach Richard Walker said the team had landed in LA a week earlier to adjust to the time zone and build momentum ahead of the winner-takes-all tournament, which runs from May 3-4.
“We wanted a different build-up. The girls are doing great,” Walker said.
The final tournament of the 2024/2025 series will see only two pools, with all teams starting fresh and whoever wins this weekend will be crowned the LA 7s champion.
“The World series champion has already been decided but this is a separate championship. It’s a clean slate; anybody can win it.”
Fijiana needed to finish in the top eight after Hong Kong and Singapore to stay in the series for next season.
Having achieved that, the team is now fully focused on winning in LA.
“We’ve shifted our goal. We’re working on fine-tuning details. We want to win LA,” he said.
Walker, who joined after the Vancouver 7s where Fijiana made the final, said it was a challenge for the players to adjust to a new coach but praised their attitude.
“At first, the girls were standing back a bit, figuring me out.
“But once we built trust, things turned around,” he said.
With a tough pool including Australia, USA and France, the focus has been heavily on defense.
“We’ve been working a lot on our edge defence, making sure we defend in twos and threes and reconnect in the middle,” Walker said.
The Fijiana side takes on Australia at 6.50am in their opening match.
The face France next at 9.29am.
Their last pool game will be at 1.02pm against USA.
