In her third column counting down to Women's Rugby World Cup 2010, Australia captain Cheryl Soon looks back on another Sevens crown in Hong Kong and her excitement ahead of the first Wallaroos training camp later this month.
READ CHERYL'S LAST COLUMN >>
My focus has now switched from Sevens to fifteens and the build up to the Women's Rugby World Cup in England later this year. But what a way to finish, leading the Aussie Amazons to the Hong Kong Women's Sevens crown two weeks ago.
We were ecstatic about the result. We knew the competition was going to be tough this year with a New Zealand Maori side attending as well as a South Africa University team. We were very pleased with the result.
We actually played New Zealand in the semi final and that was our grand final I think. We won 12-5 and it was pretty close and very fiercely contested. We came out trumps and I was very happy about that and then playing China in the final, it was a convincing win for us.
I was pleased with the result and how everyone played, some of the girls we were playing against will be at the World Cup so it was a good rehearsal and a good competition. I didn't expect to get a result like that (26-0) in the final, but I was very pleased with how the girls played and came together and stuck at it.
It felt pretty good to beat a New Zealand side again in Sevens, but while everyone was ecstatic it is something we haven't managed in fifteens. That is our next goal, to beat them in fifteens. We know it will not be an easy task, but we know what we can do and we have just got to focus on the job at hand.
JOIN THE WOMEN'S RUGBY WORLD CUP 2010 FACEBOOK PAGE!
BUY TICKETS FOR WOMEN'S RUGBY WORLD CUP 2010 >>
To be honest we don't have a lot of preparation, we would like a lot more and in particular some test matches. We only have three camps before we head off to the UK. We have to make do with what we can get and push on. Ideally I would like some test matches, that would be good preparation but we have got to soldier on with what we have got and make the most of it.
Two of our pool opponents at the World Cup - Wales and South Africa - have both played some matches recently with the Six Nations or tests with Kazakhstan last week and I think it does put us at a little bit of a disadvantage because we want to be having game time.
It is tough working on combinations, you can do that in an internal match at a training camp against each other, but we need really to play together against the best players.
It is a bit of a disadvantage, but we have done this before. We did it with the Sevens, we only had two camps before we went to the World Cup. We have faced adversity and it is about how you deal with it and how you come through it at the end. It is just believing in yourself and each other and not worrying about the little things and focusing on the job at hand.
The most incredible feeling
When we came back from the World Cup last year, a lot of girls from fifteens were so enthused by what we had achieved on our limited preparation and said we definitely want to up the level and up the intensity with training to focus on 15-a-side World Cup.
A lot of the Sevens girls told the fifteens girls that it was the most incredible feeling winning at the World Cup and there is no reason we can't do that in the fifteens if everyone on the field and the bench, the whole team, the management and the players, believe in the cause and believe in our common goal and each other and themselves. It is definitely going to be difficult, but it is something we can achieve.
My boss at work had been leaving cuttings on my desk from the Six Nations and now our coach has been emailing us links to read about the Six Nations and rugby updates, so if I don't get it from the boss I get it from the coach! They are just trying to keep us up to speed, which is no bad thing as we should be analysing our opposition.
Wales may not have had the best of Six Nations, but we are not going to take anyone lightly, whether they have won the wooden spoon or not, that is irrelevant come the World Cup. You are playing in this prestigious event and you are playing for the pride of your country and we are not going to take anyone lightly.
We are going to play each game like it's a final, whether that is against Wales, New Zealand, South Africa or whoever else we may face. We are going to throw everything at them, hammer and tongs, the kitchen sink, everything and just see how we go. We are certainly not taking Wales lightly as a result of them getting the wooden spoon.
Coming together for camp
At the end of this month we have a camp coming up in Sydney. We come together on the Friday, we will train all day Friday and Saturday and then have an internal match on the Sunday. We have then got another camp scheduled for May and June.
Twenty-six players will fly in from all over Australia for the camp. The players based in Sydney - and there is a pretty high representation from Sydney - will stay at their homes which allows the coach to fly in more players from other states. We should have around 36 girls at the camp, enough to play an internal match.
I am looking forward to it very much and I imagine so are a lot of the girls. We have been training extremely hard because we are all fighting for positions, no matter who you are.
It will be exciting to see a lot of the fifteens' girls who I have not seen for a while, I've seen the Sevens girls with only getting back from Hong Kong two weeks ago. I'm looking forward to it, it is going to be pretty exciting and pretty gruelling.
Before then we also have got a state game, New South Wales against ACT this Friday. It is the curtain raiser to the Brumbies and Hurricanes Super 14 match in Canberra. That will be a great help to our match fitness because our season just kicked off last weekend with the first club match.
It is pretty important to get matches under our belt. You can do all the fitness and speed and conditioning training, but it doesn't compare to being match fit. That is very, very important and we will take it wherever we can get it.