Revealed: Bad blood in sevens

Fiji Times - Tuesday, April 15, 2008 7:55 AM

A FIJI sevens rugby rep revealed yesterday that bad vibes among players led to their dismal outing in the last leg of the 2007/2008 IRB Sevens World Series in Hong Kong and Australia.

The player, who did not wish to be named for fear of being victimised, said all was not well in camp at So Kon Po and Adelaide Oval as bad blood surfaced between some established members of Jo Savou's team.

"There were differences amongst players, like old grudges some of the senior reps held against each other and that cost us the game.

"That contributed to our poor performance and the end result was the 34-0 loss in the semi-final against New Zealand."

He said "older players" had their own agenda while new ones were oblivious to the intimidating atmosphere at Happy Valley.

"The bad relationship amongst us remained when we came to Adelaide but because of the heavy criticism after we lost badly in Hong Kong, individual decisions were made to put aside the differences," the player added. "We were there to make Fiji proud so we wanted to do that at Adelaide and even though we played better in Australia, the older players were still not happy."

He said lack of unity was obvious on the way home.

"Everyone was quiet and went their own way once we arrived at Nadi," the player said. Fiji Rugby Union chief executive Ratu Timoci Tavanavanua denied the allegations saying they hadn't heard anything about the issue. Skipper Captain Marika Vunibaka refused to comment when Times Sport visited him at his house in Nepani on Sunday.