New Zealand Sevens eye victory at the men's world series tournament in Sydney

Teddy Stanaway breaks the defence of Samoa at the World Rugby Sevens Series in Sydne. Photo / Getty

New Zealand are putting a last-minute pool loss to Fiji behind them as they eye victory at the men's sevens world series tournament in Sydney.

The All Blacks Sevens will face unbeaten Australia in the quarter-finals on Sunday after qualifying second behind the Fijians, who pipped them 19-17.

It was a frustrating result, with New Zealand leading the Olympic champions 17-14 and in possession with 10 seconds remaining.

However, a knock-on handed Fiji possession and they made the most, sending Josua Vakurunabili across for a long-range try.

Kiwi veteran Tim Mikkelson saw a potential silver lining from the result following comfortable pool wins over Russia (61-0) and Samoa (31-0).

"Every time we play Fiji it seems to be like that. That game was almost like a final really, we had our chances to win and we didn't quite take them," he said.

"The first two games we put a lot of good tries together and didn't let any in but we'll learn more from that (the loss) and hopefully that'll show."

New Zealand, coming off a victory at the previous tournament in Cape Town in December, will hope captain Scott Curry and forward Sam Dickson can shake off injuries suffered in the Samoa match.

It may provide more opportunities for talented 18-year-old Etene Nanai-Seturo, who scored against both Russia and Samoa in his tournament debut.

Australia survived two tight matches against the United States (26-19) and Scotland (24-21) to be among four unbeaten teams.

The others are defending series champions South Africa, Argentina and Fiji.

- NZN