Wellington Sevens: NZ slump to Samoa in semifinal

Sherwin Stowers of New Zealand shows his emotion after giving away the ball in the cup semifinal. Photo / Getty Images

New Zealand's dominant start to the International Rugby Board sevens season came to a shuddering halt at the hands of Samoa at the Wellington tournament today.

Winners of the first two tournaments, New Zealand had no answer to the physically dominant Samoans in a one-sided semifinal, going down 14-24.

The match was a triumph for Samoan sevens great Uale Mai, with the captain crossing for three tries, including two in succession to seal proceedings in the second spell.

His team will face Fiji in tonight's final after the Fijians romped past England 28-19 in the other semifinal, setting up a showdown between two teams who have consistently looked the most impressive over the two days.

They met in the 2007 final here, when Samoa prevailed.

The New Zealand match was won up front by the Samoans, who were stronger at the tackle and the breakdown, allowing few opportunities for the likes of star New Zealand winger Sherwin Stowers.

In one of Stowers' few touches, he threw a gift intercept to opposite Mikaele Pesamino, who scorched 50m. It turned around a 5-7 halftime deficit for Samoa, handing them a lead they weren't to relinquish.

Experienced New Zealand forwards such as captain DJ Forbes and Lote Raikabula were uncharacteristically poor on defence, something acknowledged by the skipper.

``There were too many crucial errors, two clear ones (missed tackles) by myself were very disappointing,' Forbes told Sky Sport.

``Obviously the boys are shattered.

``Well done to the Samoans, they really stuck to their guns and punished us.'

New Zealand scored a try in each half. The first was an opportunistic 60m effort by Tim Mikkelson, who was a surprise starter ahead of veteran Zar Lawrence. The second was a last-minute consolation to Kurt Baker.

``We'll just have to sit down and have a look at the video. We had a few personnel changes and maybe the boys weren't ready,' Forbes said.

``There's no excuses, it's a heart-breaking feeling in front of our family and friends.'

Gaps had started to appear in New Zealand's game earlier today during their 24-12 quarterfinal defeat of Australia.

The tournament hosts didn't pay the full price for some shabby defensive work, allied with mixed option-taking, advancing to the final four courtesy of a late Mikkelson try.

Until then, an upset was on after Australia crossed midway through each half via Patrick McCutcheon and Bernard Foley.

New Zealand relied on the scoring foundation set by Stowers, whose blistering speed set up the first try to Lawrence and created the second for himself inside four minutes.

The try of the match was scored on the stroke of halftime by Raikabula, off some coherent team interplay which was too often missing during a stuttering New Zealand effort.

Other quarterfinal results saw Samoa beat Kenya 14-12, England thump first-day surprise packets Canada 31-0 and Fiji overrun South Africa 21-5.

- NZPA