2016-2017 World Sevens Series

[jegga]

He's a parody of himself now, I'd be interested in knowing what other people involved in Samoan rugby think of him.

[taniwharugby]

@mimic he reminds me of Hone Harawira - he makes some really good points, but they often get lost in the seemingly pointless and often racist rants he diverts onto.

[Stargazer]

Eight silver medal winning sevens players re-commit to NZ Rugby:
Captain Sarah Goss, 2015 World Rugby Sevens Player of the Year Portia Woodman, Gayle Broughton, Kelly Brazier, Kayla McAlister, Ruby Tui, Terina te Tamaki and Niall Williams.

No news about a men's and women's coach, yet.

http://allblacks.com/News/29979/silver-medal-winning-sevens-players-re-commit-to-nz-rugby

[KiwiPie]

On the news the other night, they indicated Chad Tuoro was a candidate for coaching the Men's Sevens team.

[Stargazer]

Allan Bunting, assistant coach of the Black Ferns Sevens team since 2012, has been promoted to the team's Head Coach role.

http://www.allblacks.com/News/30063/allan-bunting-appointed-head-coach-of-black-ferns-sevens

No news yet about who the next men's head coach is going to be.

[KiwiPie]

@Stargazer Another ex-Bay man at the helm ....

[mimic]

Am surprised that the NZR isn't releasing Titch to coach Samoa 7s for the 1st couple of of series..
It's not like Samoa are the dirty English or Aussies

[Stargazer]

Clark Laidlaw is the new NZ men's coach, but ...

Laidlaw will take up his new role from 1 June 2017

Our priority was getting the right coach with the long-term vision to win Olympic gold. So while we would have loved Clark to start straight away, we are happy to wait until next year because he is the best person for the job to build a winning sevens team over the long term.

New Zealand Rugby has also announced that experienced sevens coaches and former All Blacks Sevens players Scott Waldrom and Tomasi Cama will form the coaching team for the upcoming World Rugby Sevens Series tournaments starting in Dubai in December.

http://www.allblacks.com/News/30122/clark-laidlaw-appointed-head-coach-of-all-blacks-sevens

[Crucial]

It's going to be a bit rough if Scooter and Cama get the team firing well then have to step aside.

[taniwharugby]

@Crucial you'd hope there will be a lot of communication between them to ensure that transition is smooth and everyone is on the same page....that said, it is the people side of things, you can be hugely technical and be a genius but if you suck at people skills, aint gonna help much

[canefan]

I hope this new guy is good because NZR seem to be bending over to accommodate him

[rotated]

Three week preparation for the season. Seems reasonable.

[Stargazer]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/sevens/86555774/New-Zealand-sevens-coach-Clark-Laidlaw-says-centralisation-on-the-radar

[KiwiPie]

I really hope the Olympics doesn't become the whole point of Sevens as it is way too random a format to spend 4 years building towards. The point should be to win the world series as that is measure over a number of events and kind of smoothes out the random nature.

[Stargazer]

@KiwiPie said in 2016-2017 World Sevens Series:

I really hope the Olympics doesn't become the whole point of Sevens as it is way too random a format to spend 4 years building towards. The point should be to win the world series as that is measure over a number of events and kind of smoothes out the random nature.

I agree with you, although there are also the RWC Sevens and the Common Wealth Games, which both take place in 2018.

[hydro11]

@KiwiPie said in 2016-2017 World Sevens Series:

I really hope the Olympics doesn't become the whole point of Sevens as it is way too random a format to spend 4 years building towards. The point should be to win the world series as that is measure over a number of events and kind of smoothes out the random nature.

This. Even when we dominated 7's we didn't win every tournament.

[Stargazer]

First All Blacks Sevens squad named for the 2016-17 season (Dubai Sevens (2-3 December 2016) and Cape Town (10-11 December 2016)):

Scott Curry (Captain)
Tim Mikkelson
Antonio Kiri Kiri
DJ Forbes
Dylan Collier
Beaudin Waaka
Iopu Iopu-Aso
Rocky Khan
Sherwin Stowers
Jonathan Ruru (new cap)
Isaac Te Tamaki
Sione Molia

http://www.allblacks.com/News/30150/one-new-cap-in-all-blacks-sevens-squad

[Stargazer]

This selection seems to confirm my suspicion that Kaka may no longer be available for 7s (unless he's injured). There was some talk a while back that he was considering a return to XVs, although he has been playing several sevens tournaments in Asia the last few months. It will be interesting to see whether he's going to play club rugby to work his way back into the Magpies squad, or whether he'll re-appear in the sevens squad for Wellington and Sydney.

Apart from Kaka, also missing are Joe Webber (who has re-signed with the sevens squad), Teddy Stanaway, Lewis Ormond, and Regan Ware ....

I had hoped for a few more new names and not so many Olympic rejects, but awesome to see Ruru in the squad, who had a really good Mitre 10 Cup season with Otago.

[Bones]

@Stargazer Any juice on Ruru? What position?

Noted absence of Dickson, is he injured?

[Bones]

Gee Kaka is quite a loss too, especially with Ware not in the squad.