November 1995: Atlantis at Dubai Sevens
(Atlantis tournament #43)
Emil Signes
December 6, 1995
JUNE
16, 2013 (revised August 27,
2013) (revised September 15, 2018)
Note of 2013: This is the
article I submitted to Rugby Magazine; in edited form it
appeared in the December 16, 1995 issue.
Note of 2018: Fixed individual scoring table. Added
missing name to one picture. Corrected a spelling
mistake.
Atlantis practiced in NYC and then all visited Drew Fautley
at his establishment "The Rugby Club"Kiwi Nomads win Dubai Sevens
In a tremendous display of athleticism, speed and
sevens know-how, the Kiwi Nomads, coached by All Black sevens
coach Gordon Tietjens, and featuring seven players from his home
province, Bay of Plenty, crushed the talent-laden Warblers 47-19
in the Dubai Sevens.
The Nomad side, led by sevens All-Blacks Joe Tauiwi and Adrian
Cashmore, trailed 7-19 at halftime. “We were not upset,” said
captain Tauiwi, “by the halftime score. I had trust and faith in
my boys -- and we all can see the final result.”
Using this event partly as a proving ground for potential All
Black Sevens players, Tietjens included two teenagers, including a
17-year old, on the squad. The Warblers featured rugby stars from
all over the world, including New Zealand’s Stephen Bachop,
Australia’s Grant Lodge and Ryan Constable, and England’s XXX
Adebayo [or was it Ojomo?]
Other than the first half of the final, the Kiwi Nomads were never
challenged, as the results of their six games indicate.
28-7 over French Froggies
49-7 over Crawshay’s Welsh
35-7 over Roma (Italy)
43-19 over Suntory (Japan)
48-0 over Korea
47-19 over Bahrain
Warblers (world invitational)
250-59 Total Points
This comes out to an average score of 42-10 per game, and there
was an average of more than seven tries per game in their matches.
Best sevens tournament in the
world?
No less a rugby personage than England #8 Dean
Richards commented “This has to be the top sevens tournament in
the world.” At the top, missing Fiji, Samoa, New Zealand, and
Australia, obviously it’s not. But at the bottom, missing teams
like Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Singapore, etc., it means that no
“second tier” nation is guaranteed at least one win, which is
certainly the case in Hong Kong.
Dubai is a sevens player’s sevens tournament: it’s populated by
sevens specialists, and every team understands not only rugby, but
the sevens variety of the game. And several world class stars are
always in attendance.
Dubai and the United Arab
Emirates
Dubai is one of seven emirates (formerly the Trucial
States) that joined in 1971 to set up their own nation. One of the
latest nations to find oil (1959), the UAE is now one of the
richest nations in the world. Given their new-found wealth, locals
now have been supplanted in the work force by East Indians, who
make up an ever-increasing part of the population.
Gold is inexpensive in town, and we visited one street that must
have had 2-3 dozen gold shops.
The Dubai Sevens
The Dubai Sevens began as Dubai’s economy began to
burgeon. The first tournament took place in 1970, and for the next
25 years the tournament was played on sand. In 1988, with the help
of several generous sponsors, the event turned international.
London Scottish won the first international tournament, and this
was followed by wins by Crawshay’s Welsh, Toulouse, Queensland,
Scotland, White Hart Marauders, and last year by everyone’s
favorites, Korea, who knocked off in succession Natal, Queensland,
and the Warblers to win the title.
This year, for the first time, both field were converted to lush
grass, in preparation for Dubai’s status as a Sevens World Cup
qualifying tournament in 1996.
By becoming an international tournament, however, Dubai has not
lost its local status as a Gulf sevens tournament. Instead of
including the Gulf teams in the main bracket, as Hong Kong does,
however, there are several divisions, including Gulf, Women’s,
Social, Old Boys, etc. In fact, there is a kind of Cape Fear
flavor, in that there are 10 championship games during the course
of the tournament.
This year local favorites Dubai Exiles delighted the crowd by
winning the Gulf Championship, and although the Dubai women’s team
also reached their final, they were soundly defeated by the Hong
Kong Police women’s team.
Atlantis: 1-4 at Dubai
The Atlantis squad for this tournament was probably
the first-ever US team to include players from all seven US
territories:
Vaea Anitoni
|
FH
|
Tongan Yankees
|
Pacific
|
Jon Campbell
|
SH
|
Atlanta Renegades
|
Southeast
|
David Dean
|
W,FH
|
NOVA
|
MARFU
|
Jason Fox
|
H
|
Cleveland Rovers
|
Midwest
|
Brian Gallagher
|
P
|
Maryland Exiles
|
MARFU
|
Thaddeus Hill
|
W
|
Fort Worth
|
West
|
Dan Lyle
|
P
|
OMBAC |
So. Cal.
|
Martin O'Connor
|
C
|
New York
|
Northeast
|
Scott Stephens
|
P/H
|
Washington
|
MARFU
|
It was a very strong squad, certainly one of the most talented
teams Atlantis has ever fielded. Nevertheless, we did not do well,
our only win being a come from behind 24-21 win over the Irish
Wolfhounds.
Certainly the loss of Vaea Anitoni, probably our best all-around
player, during our first game, and our only legitimate big man,
Dan Lyle during the second, hurt us. (We picked up Crawshay’s
Welsh players Arwell Thomas and Graham Peacock as reserves, but
didn’t get to use them.) Nor did the fact that we were in probably
the toughest bracket in the tournament.
But in the end, the bottom line was we didn’t play well enough.
Atlantis in our stars and stripes jerseys.
By the time our second game was done we'd lost both Dan Lyle
and Vaea Anitoni
Top, L to R: Emil Signes, Martin O'Connor, Graham Peacock
(borrowed alternate), Brian Gallagher, Scott Stephens, Vaea
Anitoni
Bottom, L to R: Dan Lyle, David Dean, Jason Fox, Jon Campbell,
Arwell Thomas (borrowed alternate), Thadd Hill
Training. We were blessed with the opportunity to train
with Natal: although not a great sevens side, they were certainly
strong enough to give us fits, and with players like Kevin Putt
(15s and 7s Springbok as well as former sevens All Black) and
sevens Springbok Dieter Kriese [and others whose names I've
forgotten] working against us, we were able to identify some of
our deficiencies early.
Games.
Atlantis 10 Korea 12. Korea, last year’s defending
champion, is for real. Not only do they have last year’s
accomplishment to their credit, but they also have defeated the US
(twice), Canada, and the Barbarians during the last five years at
the Hong Kong Sevens.
This game was a bitter defeat for us: we had three penalties
within ten yards of Korea’s line and failed to convert any of
them, and then lost Vaea Anitoni with a broken hand for the
remainder of the tournament. The game ended with Jon Campbell’s
close miss of a difficult conversion attempt. Anitoni (T, C) and
Fox (T) were the Atlantis scorers in this game.
Although eventually crushed by the Kiwi Nomads, Korea continued
their excellent play after our game, defeating Leicester and
upsetting Natal in close matches.
Atlantis 7 Leicester 24. If the operative phrase for the
Korea game was “lost opportunities,” this game had to be
characterized as “no ball.” We had little possession, and when we
did, we played into Leicester’s hands: although they didn’t have a
classical sevens team there, they did have ball winners, and our
failure to win ball doomed us. Dan Lyle injured his ankle during a
first half scrum and joined Vaea Anitoni on the injured reserve
list. The only Atlantis score was a converted try by Jason Fox.
Atlantis 12 Hawkes Bay 31. Outclassed is the way to
describe this game. Hawkes Bay was simply a better team, and
tournament MVP Roger Randle scored 4 tries against us in this
match.
Atlantis 24 Irish Wolfhounds 21. These three defeats put us
at the bottom of our bracket and into the Plate Division. Our
first match on Friday, the Plate Quarterfinal, was against the
Irish Wolfhounds. After spotting them a 21-12 lead with 1:45 left
to go, back to back tries by David Dean and Thaddeus Hill gave us
our only victory of the tournament.
Due to injuries to Anitoni and Lyle, we borrowed two players,
Arwell Thomas and Graham Peacock, from Crawshay’s Welsh.
This game also marked the first time that Atlantis wore its stars
and stripes strip, a trading favorite.
Atlantis 19 Scottish Thistles 29. Another game that we
should have won: led by the running of Mark Appleson and Martin
Gregory, however, the Thistles kept Atlantis out of the game from
halftime on.
The Thistles went on to easily defeat the UBC Old Boys, the
Canadian representative. It would have been nice to see a
US-Canada final, but it was not to be.
Thanksgiving in Dubai
The games were played on Thursday and Friday,
Thanksgiving and the day after. We were sort of missing
Thanksgiving dinner at home, when we ran into the Churchmans. In
what turned out to be one of the best trades in Atlantis history,
Dan Lyle donated his stars and stripes jersey to Sheila Churchman,
who responded by inviting the entire team to her house for
Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday. Sheila and Dave and their family
are originally from New Orleans, and we were treated to turkey,
cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, stuffing with pecan, and pecan
and pumpkin pie. Awesome . . . !
Thanksgiving in Dubai: Dan Lyle donated his
stars and stripes jersey to the Churchmans
The Churchmans, an American family
living in Dubai, responded by inviting the entire team to
Thanksgiving Dinner
1996: Dubai as World Cup
Qualifier
Dubai continues to grow in importance, and in 1996
will be a World Cup qualifier; the World Cup qualifier, in fact,
in which the US will have to qualify.
Summary
For a sevens aficionado, Dubai is magnificent. For a
beer drinker, it’s very expensive. For Atlantis, it was difficult
to play below our potential.
But it was a sevens trip, and that is almost always a “good
thing.”
Atlantis Scoring summary:
Name
|
T
|
C
|
Pts
|
Fox
|
4
|
0
|
20
|
Dean
|
3
|
0
|
15 |
Campbell
|
0
|
6
|
12
|
Stephens
|
2
|
0
|
10
|
Anitoni
|
1
|
1
|
7
|
Hill
|
1
|
0
|
5
|
Lyle
|
1
|
0
|
5
|
Total
|
12
|
5
|
74
|
Opponents
|
19
|
11
|
117
|