Leading up to the USA Sevens, the San Diego Invitational (SDI) tournament will be held February 7-8, at San Diego’s Robb Fields. The event is the official tournament for all ages and skill levels associated with the USA Sevens International Tournament and Fan Festival.


The invitational is open to men, women, boys and girls and includes eight divisions: international women, women’s club sevens, international touch, masters, club, college, high school and youth. National and club teams from the U.S., Canada and Mexico, as well as a handful of other international select sides will compete in the tournament.


In its spotlight event, the SDI will showcase eight elite sides in the international women’s competition on February 8. Samoa, South Africa, USA, USA A, Canada, Canada A, Canadian collegiate side the Pandas, and an additional sides yet to be confirmed, will compete in four matches each. The championship game will be played on February 8 and awards will be presented during day one of the USA Sevens event at PETCO Park.


Another highlight comes in the collegiate bracket, which includes the current national champion, Cal-Berkeley, BYU, Navy and Utah, as well as local favorites and national qualifier San Diego State versus the University of California, San Diego in a league match.

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The first qualifiers for Rugby World Cup Sevens 2009 will be confirmed this weekend when the qualification process gets under way in Punta del Este, Uruguay.

The CONSUR Tournament, which is the first of seven regional qualifiers to be played this year, will see one men’s and one women’s team confirm places at Rugby Sevens’ showpiece in Dubai.


The two-day event, which kicks-off on Friday, sees hosts Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, Brazil, Peru, Colombia and Venezuela compete for the one available qualification place in the men’s Tournament. They will also be joined by invitational team Argentina, who has already qualified for RWC Sevens 2009 courtesy of reaching the quarter-finals at RWC Sevens 2005 in Hong Kong.


The women’s competition, which will be played on the same pitch as the men’s, will see Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Peru and Paraguay, compete for the title that will confirm a place at the Dubai Tournament in 2009.


Click here to view the full CONSUR RWC7Q schedule

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Trinidad and Tobago rugby referee Larry Mendez has been appointed as a touch judge for the 2008 USA Sevens in San Diego, California.


The two-day international sevens tournament, which will be held next February 9-10, is part of the International Rugby Board ( IRB ) World Sevens series.


The best rugby sevens nations and players in the world will be in San Diego.


Mendez, a police officer, is a former national player who represented T&T at the 1998 and 2002 Commonwealth Games. He is the current Harvard Club rugby coach and a member of the Trinidad and Tobago Rugby Football Union (T&TRFU) selection committee.


The former Tranquility Government Secondary School student said he was looking forward to the challenge of working with some of the best rugby officials in the world.

"It is a fantastic opportunity and one I intend to embrace. I have to get very fit, not only physically but also mentally. There is a lot at stake for the teams and players and the officials are under a lot of pressure ... the pace of the game is very fast and intense," Mendez said.

Mendez is following in the footsteps of fellow Trinidadian referees Paul Mowser and Anthony Pontiflette, who both officiated in previous USA Sevens.


He was appointed to the referee panel for the 2007 NAWIRA Sevens tournament held in Bahamas in November.

T&TRFU vice-president Leslie Figaro said Mendez has the ability and self-confidence to do well in San Diego.

"The real challenge for Larry will be to do well enough so that he will be invited back to future World Sevens series."

Source: T&T Express

From Joe Wipple,

West Indies Head Coach/Chairman of Selectors


I am please to announce the Rugby West Indies squad for the USA Sevens tournament in San Diego in 2008.


The players competed for the 12 travelling and 5 non-travelling (reserve) spots in the NAWIRA 7s tournament in Nassau, the Trinidad mini camp and the Trinidad 7s. We had 22 players in our camp in Trinidad and every one of them gave a very good account of themselves. In some cases, experience prevailed over youth and in others the fitness of some was not quite up to the standard required for the next level.
I am confident that we will see all of these 22 compete for the West Indies in the future, provided they put forth the effort. We expect to compete in more tournaments this year and we will be looking at additional players for these tournaments. Our basic selection criteria remain: a good level of fitness, strong in the tackle, able to play the team pattern and demonstrating good ball handling skills.

I thank our selectors:
Noel Adonis (Guyana)

Victor Hyder (Jamaica)
Curtis Nero (Trinidad)

Dave Mays (Cayman)
Spenser Robinson (Technical Director)

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Thanks to Jennifer O'Neill for these photographs.


I've reduced the quality of the images considerably in order to present them here and these don't do Jen's photography justice. However, if you'd like a full quality ( 4.5MB ) copy of any of the pictures below, please contact me: ely@rugbybahamas.com, quoting the image ID number.


There are 150 pictures in total and I've put them in groups of 30, in chronological order of games throughout the two days. This is the fifth set.

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