Bristol Rugby, Top 14 Final, JWC Final, USA Rugby And More

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NEW YORK, NY – A lot happened in the world of rugby over the past few days… Rugby News, Transactions, Results… With that, let’s begin the Global Rugby Recap:

News & Transactions:

Aviva Premiership: Bristol have parted ways with their head coach. If you are thinking about Andy Robinson, you would be wrong because he is the Director of Rugby and oversees the performance of the club’s Men’s, Women’s and youth teams. Head coach Sean Holley, a key figure in the club’s promotion to the Premiership, left by mutual consent following three seasons… Sale Sharks announced the signing of Wales and Cardiff Blues second-row Lou Reed on a two-year contract.

ProD2: According to our friends at ARN (Americas Rugby News), Promising locks Manuel Plaza of Argentina and Paul Ciulini of Canada will join Perpignan for the coming season. The 20-year-olds have signed academy deals with the French Pro D2 side.

Super Rugby: Sunwolves coach Mark Hammett has belatedly confirmed his departure from the Japanese Super Rugby team. Former All Blacks winger Zac Guildford has cut short his Super Rugby season after leaving the Waratahs. Guildford has taken the opportunity to move back to New Zealand with limited time left in his short term contract with the Waratahs… New Zealand Rugby and the Crusaders announced that loosehead prop Joe Moody has recommitted for another three years until the end of the 2019 season.

USA Rugby: USA Rugby announced they are in the final stages of their search for a new Chief Executive Officer (CEO), however a date of hire remains tentative at this time. Current Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Jim Snyder has been given the role of Acting CEO while still fulfilling his CFO duties… USA Rugby Boys High School All-American Head Coach Salty Thompson has selected a touring team of 26 players to play in two matches against the Ontario Blues under-19 development team in Ontario, Canada. For a full list of names of the 26 young men, click here. If you do follow the link then you will see RWU staff member Luke Bienstock‘s name on there as well as Luke Persanis, whose dad is, friend of RWU Matt Persanis.

World Rugby: Springbok full-back Willie le Roux is suspended for one week after pleading guilty to a charge of breaching Law 10.4 (i), during Saturday’s Test match between South Africa and Ireland in Port Elizabeth. Le Roux was cited by commissioner James Absaloms of Kenya for making contact with Ireland full-back Tiernan O’Halloran in the 11th minute of the match as they both leaped in the air for a high ball… The latest edition of the World Rugby Rankings are out. Click here to view full rankings.

The weekend’s fixtures:

PRO Rugby: Heading into the eleventh week of action in the inaugural season, San Francisco traveled to the midwest to face Ohio and got taken behind the woodshed as Ohio destroyed them. In the other match-up this weekend, Denver stayed neck and neck with Ohio for the league lead as they outfought and outlasted Sacramento. We will have a reviews of each match coming out shortly.

Here are the results:
Sun – 26 Jun 2016
San Francisco 13-71 Ohio
Sacramento 13-29 Denver

Top 14: The Top 14 final has been played and the season is finally over. It will restart in 8 weeks but let’s just celebrate its conclusion, for now. As reported by our man in France, James Harrington, in the comments section of the Weekend Preview, the match was an instant classic. According to Monsieur Harrington, “The Top 14 title match was entertaining – and, for the record, it was held at F.C. Barcelona, the Spanish Soccer giant’s stadium, the Nou Camp because the Euro 2016 soccer tournament was hogging all the suitable stadia in France. It can’t have been a bad decision, either. Official crowd was 99,124, a record for a club rugby game by some distance. Huge chapeau to Racing, who won despite playing more than an hour with 14 men after Maxime Machenaud was sent off for a dangerous tackle on Matt Giteau.”

Here are the results:
Fri – 24 Jun 16
Toulon 21-29 Racing 92

2016 Women’s Olympic Repechage: Spain once again shocked on-lookers by defeating Russia to claim the final qualification place for the 2016 Rio Olympics. It was only just last week, their mens‘ team shocked the world by qualifying for Rio, now the women have done the same. The two top ranked sides and part of the Womens’ Sevens World Series were favored to be in the final and didn’t disappoint. Many thought Russia would win but in a small upset, the tournament winner was Spain. Ireland claimed the bronze to complete the thrilling weekend.

Here are the results:
2016 Women’s Olympic Repechage Final Standings
1. Spain
2. Russia
3. Ireland
4. Kazakhstan
5. China
6. Argentina
7. Tunisia
8. Samoa
9. Cook Islands
10. Hong Kong
11. Portugal
12. Venezuela
13. Madagascar
14. Zimbabwe
15. Trinidad & Tobago
16. Mexico

*England’s Dylan Hartley and coach Eddie Jones pose_with The Cook Cup, the winner’s trophy for whenever the two countries meet.*

June Internationals: The Men’s June International season continued this weekend and there are a lot matches to go over. The early result that came in from the other side of the world is that Georgia‘s tour of the South Pacific was a success. With their defeat of Fiji, the newly crowned Pacific Nations Cup champion, Georgia finished the tour undefeated with a record of two wins and one draw. The long list of matches for Saturday began with New Zealand soundly defeating Wales for a sweep of their three test series. Australia fell to England as England completed a historic sweep of Aussies. In the third test between South Africa and Ireland, the Springboks narrowly won the series decider. The fixture list continued with Argentina being blanked by a weakened France, Japan fell to Scotland, and the USA dominated Russia. A recap of the USA match should be out shortly. The final match of the weekend saw Canada narrowly lose to Italy.

Here are the results:
Fri – 24 Jun 16
Fiji 3-14 Georgia
Sat – 18 Jun 16
New Zealand 46-6 Wales
Australia 40-44 England
South Africa 19-13 Ireland
Argentina 0-27 France
Japan 16-21 Scotland
USA 25-0 Russia

Junior World Cup: The JWC is the yearly World Cup held for U-20 teams of the top tier rugby playing nations. Georgia qualified for it by winning last year’s Junior World Trophy, the second tier competition. This year’s tournament is being held in Manchester, England. For those looking to watch the action in the USA, the JWC can be seen using the Watch ESPN app on your Roku, Firestick and other devices or on ESPN3.com. This weekend was “finals” day as every position is in the final standings has match to determine where a team finishes. In the 11th place final, where the loser gets relegated, Japan fell to Italy. In the battle for 9th place France edged out Georgia while Scotland where thumped Wales for the 7th place title. Long time foes New Zealand and Australia meet with the Baby Blacks winning convincingly and taking the 5th place final while South Africa fell big to Argentina in the fight for 3rd place. In the championship final, England comfortably defeated Ireland to take the title.

Here are the results:
Sat – 25 Jun 16
11th place final: Italy 41-17 Japan
9th place final: Georgia 24-27 France
7th place final: Scotland 19-42 Wales
5th place final: Australia 24-55 New Zealand
3rd place final: Argentina 49-19 South Africa
Championship final: Ireland 21-45 England

Pacific Nations Cup: Of all of World Rugby’s Cup tournaments to benefit Tier 2 and Tier 3 nations, the Pacific Nations Cup is arguably the biggest and best. The Pacific island nations of Tonga, Fiji and Manu Samoa are the top tier 2 nations in the world. They produce some of the world’s best players and on occasion a side can be found to be ranked higher than a 6 Nations side. This year’s PNC doubles as Rugby World Cup 2019 qualifying matches. With Georgia‘s tour of the Pacific Islands, it appears that when one of the three nations is suppose to be on a bye, they will be playing Georgia and this weekend it was Fiji as we previously mentioned. With Fiji having defeated Samoa and Tonga already to become the PNC champions, this weekend’s match between Samoa and Tonga was a battle for second place. In that match, Samoa defeated Tonga with surprising ease.

Here are the results:
Sat – 25 Jun 16
Samoa 30-10 Tonga

Africa Cup: The Africa Cup 2016 will be the sixteenth edition of the continental tournament that involves the best African national teams, organized by the Rugby Afrique, formerly known as the Confederation of African Rugby (CAR). Given their superiority, the South African national team has rarely participated in most tournaments. The four times the SARU has participated, they sent either a U-23 team or amateur side, and went on to win it. Beyond South Africa, there are up to 27 rugby countries in the Cup with the national participants in the two divisions with each division divided into three groups (1A, 1B, 1C, 2 West, 2 East, and 2 South), with promotion and relegation. In 1B, the teams are divided into pools and in pool B action this weekend, Tunisia thumped Botswana.

Here are the results:
Sun – 19 Jun 16
1B (Pool B): Tunisia 43-10 Botswana

2016 Currie Cup qualification: The tournament is a competition between which will be played between 9 April and 23 July 2016. It will feature all fourteen South African provincial unions plus the Welwitschias from Namibia and will also serve as a qualifying competition for the 2016 Currie Cup, the 78th edition of South Africa’s premier domestic rugby union competition. Nine teams from this competition will play in the 2016 Currie Cup Premier Division, while the remaining six teams will play in the 2016 Currie Cup First Division. Round twelve’s fixtures began with SouthWest District falling to the Blue Bulls, then we had the Griffons top Free State, while Griquas were too much for the Sharks and the Pumas trounced Eastern Province. Also on the fixture list, the Leopards lost big to the Golden Lions, Boland absolutely smashed the Welwitschias and finally the Falcons came up short against Western Province.

Here are the results:
Fri – 24 Jun 16
SWD Eagles 23-28 Blue Bulls
Sat – 25 Jun 16
Griffons 49-33 Free State XV
Griquas 36-14 Sharks XV
Pumas 53-20 Eastern Province Kings
Leopards 28-64 Golden Lions XV
Boland Cavaliers 110-10 Welwitschias
Falcons 31-59 Western Province