By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Springboks Sevens delivered an outstanding performance that brought them the SVNS World Championship title in Los Angeles after beating Spain 19-5 in the final.
Tries from Selvyn Davids, Mfundo Ndhlovu and Ricardo Duarttee were enough to down the uncompromising Spaniards.
Despite the title of World Championship winners, Argentina are the SVNS World Series winners after finishing the regular season having won three of the six legs of the SVNS series and finishing on 104 overall points.
The Springbok Sevens finished the World Series in fourth place — having only won the Cape Town leg, ending on 70 points.
The top eight teams (out of 12) competed in the World Championship in Los Angeles, with the remaining four battling it out against Challenger series teams.
It is the second year that this convoluted SVNS system has been in place, with more changes to the system announced for next season.
South Africa headed to Los Angeles on the back of two ninth-place finishes, in Singapore and Hong Kong, but hit back in the most important tournament.
South Africa’s victories in LA included beating Olympic champions France, Great Britain and high-flying Argentina in the group phase before whalloping old-foes New Zealand 31-5 in the semi-finals.
New Zealand beat Argentina 38-17 in the third-place playoff. If New Zealand had gone all the way and won the trophy in LA, they would have done so with a highest-place finish of fourth — in Dubai last year — across the World Series season.
While the new format — which will be revamped again next season — gives everyone a fair shot at the World Championship title, it doesn’t reward consistency throughout the season.
Blitzboks coach Philip Snyman heaped praise on the team after a commanding weekend in the 2024-25 finale, with the Blitzboks finishing unbeaten and crowned winners on Sunday.
“This team delivered an amazing performance over the weekend,” said Snyman.
“The players deserve so much credit for the way they played here in Los Angeles. We had some good parts and some bad parts to our season, but this weekend we got it all together and that is a very satisfying feeling.
“Any coach will tell you that your plan can only be as good as the buy-in from the players and then their execution thereof. This weekend it all come together.
“They really stuck to our plan, but also importantly, played the moments when it was there to exploit. They did some exceptional things on the field during this tournament and all the credit must go to them.
“Some of those moments of brilliance by the players in the final made this a special win.”
Snyman believes the weekend proved that the Blitzboks are back to where they should be: “This performance was proof of the potential of this squad. The players executed their roles so well, there was a common belief in what is possible and how to achieve that and the result is there for them to enjoy now.
“This performance finally completes the puzzle for us, and what a beautiful picture we got. This was the true colours of Springbok Sevens and I cannot be prouder of what it represented and displayed this weekend.”
The former skipper also reflected on the big moments of the weekend and said they “were up for it”.
“Our defence was great, the attack worked so well, while there was this hunger in each player to use this tournament to make up for the disappointing ones we had along the way,” he said.