Murphy Crowe Reaches Milestone In Dubai As Ireland Women Progress To Last-Eight

Ireland and the Black Ferns Sevens are set to battle it out at 10.04am local time/6.04am Irish time tomorrow morning, following two Pool A wins for Allan Temple-Jones’ charges against Fiji (30-12) and China (31-21).

Captain Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe helped herself to five tries, and her first effort in a second half hat-trick against China saw her become the first Irish player, male or female – and only the third Women’s player worldwide – to score 200 SVNS Series tries.

The newly-married Tipperary native, whose record now stands at 202 tries in 231 matches, joins an exclusive club which only included New Zealand duo Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (256) and Michaela Blyde (247) up to this point.

Over ten years on from Murphy Crowe’s first cap, 19-year-olds Hannah Clarke and Robyn O’Connor made their Ireland Sevens debuts today, and the pool stages also witnessed a welcome return from injury for Béibhinn Parsons.

Parsons’ fellow Galwegian, Clarke, opened the scoring against Fiji with a pacy finish, and scrum half O’Connor, a proud product of Wexford Wanderers RFC, joined her in making two starts so far.

There were some early touches for newcomers Clarke and O’Connor as Ireland, wearing their new Canterbury home kit, kicked off the weekend chasing their 14th victory in 30 World Series meetings with Fiji.

Clarke chased back to deny a dummying Lavena Cavuru a try, but the Fijians retained possession and Vika Nakacia, one of their nine new caps, stepped inside Anna McGann to dart in under the posts. Ana Maria Naimasi converted with three minutes on the clock.

However, Ireland fired back with three unconverted tries before half-time. Erin King firstly hooked the ball back at a Fijian scrum, and Clarke slipped out of a tackle, fended off Nakacia and accelerated clear on the right for a fine score from 40 metres out.

King, the World Rugby Women’s 15s Breakthrough Player of the Year, scrambled possession back from the restart, allowing Vicky Elmes Kinlan to weave through and give O’Connor a glimpse of the try-line. She was tackled just short but King used the quick ruck ball to put Elmes Kinlan over in the corner.

The same two players combined to make it 15-7 at the break, with King batting back Stacey Flood’s pinpoint restart and then popping up to provide the assist at the end of a Flood-led attack.

Murphy Crowe was sprung from the bench and crossed in the ninth minute, her in-and-out run taking her away from two defenders on a 60-metre burst to the line. She soon added a second try, profiting from Emily Lane and Megan Burns’ determination to win turnover ball.

Replacement Clare Gorman then got her hands free in a double tackle, brilliantly popping the ball up for the onrushing King to complete Ireland’s scoring late on. Milika Drugunavanua’s similarly well-timed offload released Ilisapeci Delaiwau for a consolation try.

Giving her reaction after the 30-12 victory, the ever-influential Flood said: “We started with a young squad there, and it’s great for them to get that experience on the World Series. Start with a win and start as we mean to go on.

“We’re pretty pleased with that, it’s everything that we wanted to do in training building up to this. Obviously there’s always stuff to fix, especially in Sevens, so we’ll go back, look at that and build on it for the next game.

“Hannah and Robyn are getting on brilliant. I think you can see in Ireland girls are starting to play younger, and I think it’s such a credit to them girls.

“They’re 19 and they’re flying it out there, they don’t look out of place whatsoever. We’re lucky to have that support system coming through the youths now, and it’s just going to make our squad a whole lot better.”

After gaining promotion back to the top tier at the end of last season, China’s return to the SVNS Series stage was marred by a 52-point hammering by Australia but they showed how good that can be with a fast start against Ireland.

Dou Xinrong evaded Clarke on two occasions to run in a cracking opening try from far out. Gao Xiaoyang’s movement off the ball then sucked in two defenders for Hu Yu who scooted around into the open space to go in behind the posts.

The ball went loose from China’s restart, with Yan Meiling breaking onto the it. Possession was swiftly whipped out to the opposite wing where Xiaoyang had the pace to finish off from just outside the Irish 22. Zheng Wenyan tagged on her third conversion.

Ireland managed to put some attacking phases together approaching half-time, with McGann and Flood both eating up the ground. A couple of penalties allowed Lane to go quickly, and the supporting King reached over from a close-in ruck just past the hooter.

Temple-Jones introduced Eve Higgins, Parsons, and Murphy Crowe for the start of the second half, and the latter blazed through for her 200th SVNS Series try when a neat switch with Burns invited forward and she sprinted clear after handing off Wenyan. Flood converted.

China threatened a breakaway score before Murphy Crowe chased down Sun Yue, and when Parsons broke out of two attempted tackles to race over from the left, Higgins followed up with the conversion to close the gap to just two points – 21-19.

Ireland went ahead from the restart as Higgins’ brilliantly-placed kick caused trouble for China, and Murphy Crowe gobbled up the bouncing ball to score from the right wing. The skipper made it a hat-trick inside the final seconds, getting the better of Xinrong to complete a five-try comeback.

With two wins from two, Ireland moved on to battle it out for top spot in the pool with Australia. O’Connor’s early half-break sparked a strong start from the girls in green, who narrowly missed out on a try when a tackled King knocked on over the line.

Instead it was the top seeds who took a fourth-minute lead, as Maddison Levi, day one’s dominant figure scoring-wise, made sure she was first to Charlotte Caslick’s long kick downfield and there was no catching her.

Teenager O’Connor drew a high tackle to give Ireland the platform to strike back. Flood’s clever run off the scrum saw her get past Maddison Levi and then dish off a sweetly-timed pass for Burns to make it a two-point game.

Frustratingly for Ireland, Higgins was pinged for taking just too long with the restart kick. One final Australian attack delivered a second try, this time Caslick using Sariah Paki’s run off the ball to dummy and accelerate through a gap to leave it 12-5 at the interval.

New Australia captain Isabella Nasser produced a ball-dislodging tackle on Murphy Crowe early in the second half, and the resulting scrum was the launchpad for Maddison Levi’s ninth try of the day, widening the margin to 12 points.

Ireland worked their way downfield in response, with Murphy Crowe and Higgins drawing tackles out wide, but Paki managed to rip possession back. Higgins bundled Heidi Dennis into touch soon after, only for the lineout to let Ireland down.

Nathan used her experience to get outside Clarke, adding a fourth and final score from inside her own half. The 24-5 defeat will see Ireland play Pool C winners New Zealand tomorrow, while Canada, the second best third place finishers, will be Australia’s quarter-final opponents.

IRELAND WOMEN’S SEVENS Squad (HSBC SVNS Series – Emirates Dubai 7s, The Sevens Stadium, Dubai, UAE, Saturday, November 30-Sunday, December 1, 2024):

Kathy Baker (Blackrock College RFC)
Megan Burns (Blackrock College RFC)
Hannah Clarke (Tuam/Oughterard RFC/Galwegians RFC/Connacht) *
Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe (Railway Union RFC) (capt)
Stacey Flood (Railway Union RFC)
Clare Gorman (Old Belvedere RFC)
Eve Higgins (Railway Union RFC)
Erin King (Old Belvedere RFC)
Vicky Elmes Kinlan (Wicklow RFC)
Emily Lane (Blackrock College RFC)
Anna McGann (Railway Union RFC)
Robyn O’Connor (Wexford Wanderers RFC/Leinster) *
Béibhinn Parsons (Blackrock College RFC)

* Denotes uncapped player

IRELAND WOMEN’S SEVENS Schedule – HSBC SVNS Series – Dubai:

Saturday, November 30 –

POOL A:

IRELAND 30 FIJI 12, The Sevens Stadium pitch 1, Dubai
Scorers: Ireland: Tries: Hannah Clarke, Vicky Elmes Kinlan 2, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe 2, Erin King
Fiji: Tries: Vika Nakacia, Ilisapeci Delaiwau; Con: Ana Maria Naimasi
HT: Ireland 15 Fiji 7

Team: Vicky Elmes Kinlan, Erin King, Anna McGann, Robyn O’Connor, Stacey Flood, Megan Burns, Hannah Clarke.

Replacements used: Eve Higgins, Emily Lane, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe (capt), Clare Gorman, Kathy Baker.

IRELAND 31 CHINA 21, The Sevens Stadium pitch 1, Dubai
Scorers: Ireland: Tries: Erin King, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe 3, Béibhinn Parsons; Cons: Stacey Flood, Eve Higgins 2
China: Tries: Dou Xinrong, Hu Yu, Gao Xiaoyang; Cons: Zheng Wenyan 3
HT: Ireland 5 China 21

Team: Anna McGann, Erin King, Clare Gorman, Emily Lane, Stacey Flood, Megan Burns, Hannah Clarke.

Replacements used: Eve Higgins, Béibhinn Parsons, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe (capt), Kathy Baker. Not used: Robyn O’Connor.

AUSTRALIA 24 IRELAND 5, The Sevens Stadium pitch 1, Dubai
Scorers: Australia: Tries: Maddison Levi 2, Charlotte Caslick, Faith Nathan; Cons: Teagan Levi, Ruby Nicholas
Ireland: Try: Megan Burns
HT: Australia 12 Ireland 5

Team: Eve Higgins, Erin King, Béibhinn Parsons, Robyn O’Connor, Stacey Flood, Megan Burns, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe (capt).

Replacements used: Emily Lane, Vicky Elmes Kinlan, Kathy Baker, Hannah Clarke, Clare Gorman.

Sunday, December 1 –

CUP QUARTER-FINAL:

NEW ZEALAND v IRELAND, The Sevens Stadium pitch 1, Dubai, 10.04am local time/6.04am Irish time