Canada dropped its opening two matches at the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series event in Singapore

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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Canada dropped its opening two matches at the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series event in Singapore on Saturday, before closing out pool play with a victory.

The Canadians, 12th in the overall standings, lost their opener 50-12 to Fiji before being shut out by South Africa, 33-0.

They wrapped up their final pool game with a 33-10 victory over No. 10 Scotland.

The Canadian men won the Singapore tournament in 2017, their lone victory on the World Series. But a tough draw following a poor showing in Hong Kong last week had them facing two of the top four teams on the circuit in pool play.

Fiji was upset 19-12 by Scotland and beaten 17-7 by South Africa. The Blitzboks (3-0-0) won Pool A with Fiji, Scotland and Canada all showing 1-2-0 records. Fiji finished second on points difference with Canada fourth after its two lopsided losses.

New Zealand, U.S., Aussies unbeaten

Canada's next match comes against No. 14 Japan in the consolation Challenge Trophy quarter-finals on Saturday at 10:44 p.m. ET.

New Zealand, the U.S., and Australia joined South Africa in winning all three of their pool matches.

The Cup quarter-finals are South Africa versus Samoa, the U.S. versus Argentina, New Zealand versus Fiji and Australia versus England.

The top four teams at the end of the 10-event season secure automatic qualification to the 2020 Olympics.

Fiji dominant

Mike Fuailefau and Justin Douglas led the Canadians out against Fiji, in honour of their 50th tournaments.

Canada beat Fiji 26-19 the last time they met in March in Vancouver. But Saturday's result improved Fiji's lead in the head-to-head meetings to 48-5.

Fiji was coming off winning the Hong Kong event for the fifth year in a row while Canada tied for 15th in what Damian McGrath, in a social media posting, called "without a doubt the worst tournament we've played since I began coaching Canada 7s."

Matt Mullins, Harry Jones, Nathan Hirayama, Phil Berna and Jake Thiel scored tries in the win over Scotland after the shutout by South Africa.