Having reached the quarter-finals in the opening two rounds in Australia and Dubai, Wales failed to make the main draw on day two of the Cell C Nelson Mandela Bay Sevens after suffering heavy defeats to USA and hosts South Africa.
Wales dropped down to the Bowl on day two where they over-turned a halftime deficit of 7-17 to snatch a last gasp 24-22 victory over Samoa in the quarter-finals but their quest for any silverware was then quashed by Canada who won the Bowl semi-final clash with a 24-14 triumph.
A disappointed Wales coach, Gareth Williams was left scratching his head after his side picked up only five points from the tournament.
“We started game one against Kenya in excellent fashion, executing the game plan we had discussed all week,” he said.
“The second match against USA started in a similar, positive vein, only for us to gift momentum back to the opposition with a very silly penalty and a forced offload which gave them impetus in the game. The disappointment in that match was the inability to respond to a bad period and show a level of composure to get us back in to the match as positively as we had started.
“The effects of our game management carried over in to the South African match and we got drawn in to their style of play that cost us from a possession point of view.”
Williams was pleased his side made amends in the Bowl against Samoa where he said the squad had learned the harsh lessons from the day before but he was obviously disappointed to bow out in the semi-finals to Canada.
Wales now have a couple of months to re-group before the next two rounds in Wellington (February 6-7) and Las Vegas (February 13-15 and Williams has no doubt where the improvement is required.
“We need to increase repetition of what we do well and keep doing it to a degree that keeps teams under pressure,” he said.
“The squad is going through some learning at the moment that includes dealing with momentum of games, and the continuous nature of tournaments. This is proving a great learning curve for a number of developing individuals, as well as highlighting characters of players along the way.”
