Ireland's hopes of a first ever Women's Rugby World Cup
semi final end despite their biggest win of the tournament, but
their Six Nations rivals England will enter the last four on a high
despite conceding their first points of the tournament.
ENGLAND v USA
By Nathaniel John
England will enter the semi finals as the top seed
after beating USA 37-10 in the final pool match of Women's
Rugby World Cup, setting up a last four showdown with Australia at
the Twickenham Stoop on Wednesday.
Tries from Danielle Waterman (2), Katherine Merchant, Emily
Scarratt, Amber Penrith and Maggie Alphonsi were enough to give the
host nation a bonus point win at a deceptively cold Surrey Sports
Park in Guildford.
VIEW THE MATCH DETAILS >>
Waterman opened the scoring with a superb individual try
after only four minutes of the Pool B encounter. Wing Charlotte
Barras expertly collected a high ball from Christy
Ringgenberg's attempted clearance and spread the ball to
Waterman, who first stepped the on-rushing USA defence before
showing blistering pace to score in the corner.
Katy McLean extended England's lead to 8-0 with a
well-struck penalty with 10 minutes gone.
The USA responded midway through the first half with a try
from Nathalie Marchino. The wing made the initial break deep into
England's 22 and after the ball was recycled and worked through
several phases, it came out to Marchino who did well to finish in
the corner.
With five minutes remaining until the interval, England
extended their lead to 13-5 when McLean's clever grubber kick
was perfectly weighted for the pace of the on-rushing Merchant to
collect and score.
With USA down to 14 players after Marchino was yellow carded,
England took full advantage with the penultimate play of the half
with another brilliant individual try from the impressive Waterman.
The full back showed quick feet, stepping several defenders before
scoring under the posts to send England in leading 20-5 at the
break.
England began the second half in the same manner as they
finished the first, with the backs running with conviction,
confidence and power but just misjudging the final pass on a couple
of occasions.
Ten minutes into the second half, outside centre Scarratt
took matters into her own hands when, from another smart back move,
she took the ball wide on the right, crashing through two tackles
before pacing to the line to give England a 25-5 lead.
Just after the hour mark, despite being once again down to
14, the Women's Eagles managed to score their second try of the
game through scrum half Kim Magrini. A well-placed kick from
Ringgenberg gave USA possession in the England 22 and the play was
spread wide with Magrini on hand to bundle the ball over the line,
reducing the deficit to 25-10.
England put the gloss on victory with little over five
minutes left to play, when replacement Penrith completed yet
another well-worked, fluid back move using her pace to beat the USA
defence on the outside.
Flanker Alphonsi, an ever-present thorn in the USA's
side, completed the scoring with a well-deserved try. The flanker
collected the ball from McLean before side-stepping her way to the
try-line from 15 metres.
While England look forward to a semi final with the
Wallaroos, USA have to contend themselves with a rematch with
Ireland - who beat them 22-12 on day two - as they start to battle
it out for the fifth to eighth places in the final standings.
POST MATCH REACTION
England coach Gary Street: "I'm really
pleased with that, we would have taken that before the tournament
started. The girls really showed physically tonight. The forwards
were tremendous and set the platform, and the backs had some
chances so really pleased.
"We had desire and determination. The Americans really
hit breakdowns hard and they put in some hard tackling. I think we
just kept our resolve, in the second half especially we played in
the right areas and took our chances when they came."
England captain Catherine Spencer: "We were
saying to each other before the game that we just needed to go out
there and win. It's fantastic and it's exactly where we
want to be at this stage of the tournament. USA got the ball and
just kept running at us and they've got some really powerful
girls but we kept our discipline in defence. We worked hard up
front to create the space for our backs out wide."
"We know that they [Australia] are a good side and that
they move the ball well. They are Sevens champions, but we will
rest up well and look at the mistakes we made today so that we are
ready for them. The change of venue will be exciting and hopefully
the fantastic support that we have can come with us to the
Stoop."
England try-scorer Danielle Waterman: "I'm
really, really happy. It was really hard out there and really
pleased with the score that we had and the bonus point, just
looking forward to the semis against Australia now.
"I'm really pleased to have scored those two tries,
but our forward pack grafted away, putting in some massive hits
putting us on the front foot, so all credit to them, I just got the
running glory."
USA coach Kathy Flores: "I'm disappointed
but I am proud of the team. We said they would have to leave
everything on the field and they definitely left it on the field.
"I think that internationally, we are pretty young and
naive in that sense. We get out there and we learn a lot of things
while we are on the field so I think we have improved tremendously
as we go through the tournament and we still have two more games.
"I think that really England understands the game a lot
better than we do. They understand when they need to turn on and
when to turn off but also tactically they understand things a
little bit better and I think we gave away some opportunities more
in our decision making today than we did with anything else."
USA captain Ashley English: "We kept
possession of the ball a lot better than we did last time [against
Ireland]. I felt like we got around the outside really well so
I'm happy about that. Our scrum was pretty good today as well.
We need to score more points, so if we can get that down will be
good."
IRELAND v KAZAKHSTAN
By Daniel Welling
Ireland produced a solid display to beat Kazakhstan 37-3 and
finish their Pool B campaign at Women's Rugby World Cup 2010,
but it wasn't enough for the girls in green to reach a first
ever semi final.
Tries from Niamh Briggs, Louise Beamish, Orla Brennan, Eliza
Downey, Kate O'Loughlin and another Joy Neville brace gave
Ireland hope, but they couldn't score the required number of
points to stay in contention for the best second placed spot across
the three pools.
VIEW THE MATCH DETAILS >>
Ireland needed to come out of the blocks fast and they did
just that. After one minute, Downey broke down the left wing,
worked the ball to Briggs who was sharp enough to scoop up a loose
ball just before it dropped to score the try.
Kazakhstan were determined to put up a fight after two heavy
losses and looked dangerous on the overlap when the chances came,
but Phillip Doyle's side did not buckle and rallied to score
their second try on 17 minutes.
They used their strength in the ruck to power their way
towards the line with the in-form Neville grounding the ball.
Briggs kicked a difficult conversion to make the score 12-0 and
eight minutes later, Ireland scored their third try in almost
exactly the same way.
After winning a lineout, they used their strength again to
almost force their way over the line and scrum half Beamish,
seizing her chance in the starting line up after Tania Rosser was
forced out of the tournament with a dislocated shoulder, forced the
ball over the line.
The attacks kept coming as fantastic run from Jo
O'Sullivan saw her skip past three defenders to lay off to the
on-rushing Brennan to score Ireland's fourth try and secure the
try bonus point. Briggs' missed conversion meant the score was
22-0.
However, Kazakhstan began to rally and after a foray into the
Ireland half, they got the chance to score their first points of
the tournament. They won a penalty straight in front of the posts
and it was duly converted by full back Aigerym Daurembayeva right
on half time.
The second half started just as the first had with the Irish
started on fire again, working the ball to the left wing allowing
Downey to increase the lead to 27-3.
It was a much more equal contest after the break as Asian
champions Kazakhstan held firm and looked to attack with wing Olga
Sazonova nearly going clear down the right wing only to be dragged
into touch.
Irish spirits seemed to be fading as Helen Brosnan was forced
off injured after 61 minutes as neither side had enough time in the
respective 22s to cause major problems for their opponents.
Ireland, though, had one final surge and when the chance did
come, they took it. Briggs made another good run on the right and
as she was brought down, scrum half Beamish found the darting
O'Loughlin to score the try.
The score seemed to spur the Irish on as Neville powered her
way over again on 72 minutes for her fourth try of the tournament.
The lively number 8 came agonisingly close to claiming a hat-trick
late on but was held up over the line.
Ireland will now turn their attentions to improving their
position of eighth four years ago, while Kazakhstan will play-off
for the places ninth to 12th over the final two days of the
tournament.
POST MATCH REACTION
Ireland coach Philip Doyle: "I am very happy
indeed, we went out with the intentions of getting the bonus point
and that's what we did. We did our goal. Unfortunately we
didn't get into the semis because of other teams, we had to
rely on Canada to win their match to set it up but unfortunately
they lost to France. But in our game, goal achieved, we are in our
middle group, I'm not too sure where we are, but
delighted."
Ireland captain Fiona Coghlan: "I'm
delighted with the win and the bonus point, that is what we set out
to do so we did that. A few areas we need to tidy up on going
forward but we got what we wanted out of this game.
"When we got the ball we made breaks and we had support
lines running. Our lineout worked well, we got our clean ball off
the scrums so our set piece went really well, [but] it still needs
to be tidied up going forward.
"We are looking for a higher ranking on eighth. We will
have to wait and see who we get in the next round so we are looking
for a higher ranking and we will settle for that."
Kazakhstan vice captain Anastassiya
Khamova: "It is really great, obviously we wanted to
put more points on the board but it is pretty good to get those
three up there.
"It has been difficult in last two games because it was
a difficult group, we had some some difficult matches going up
against some pretty good teams but we hope in the next few mathes
we can show our true colours and show some of our real class.
"We have learnt a lot in this World Cup, there is a big
difference in standards between here and Kazakhstan and Asia so we
are hoping to play more against people and teams of this standard
and hopefully improve the team."
