Trailing Samoa 16-10 at halftime the Vodafone Flying Fijians were instruted of the following in their dressing room:

•             No individual play
•             Run direct
•             Play out wide

This was told by captain Sunia Koto who said the message boosted the player’s performance as they went in the second half to score a handsome 26-16 win. “This was the same half time message we got last week when we went on to beat Tonga,” he said.

“The boys kept the ball and kept on running straight and we just stuck to our system.”

Despite the win, Koto says, it was another slow start for the Flying Fijians.

“We were planning to start with the bang but unfortunately the Samoans came out really hard in the first 20 minutes as they read our game plan. We panicked as we were throwing the ball around which we shouldn’t have.”

The skipper acknowledged the crowd support and dedicated the win to former Flying Fijians star centre Seru Rabeni and prop Sairusi Naituku who both passed away this year.

“Also this win is dedicated to all our children as well,” he added.

Lemi gracious in defeat

Manu Samoa side failed to play 80 minutes of rugby and this cost us the game, says a disappointed Samoan captain David Lemi.

He also went on to congratulate the Vodafone Flying Fijians for retaining the Pacific Nations Cup.

“We started well but we didn’t finish well,” he said.

“We take the positives from today as we are going to meet Tonga next week. We want to thank God that no one was seriously injured today.”

Hosting Tonga in Apia next Saturday, Lemi says, they will focus on producing the positives.

“We will have to look at what we want to improve on, keep on pressing the positives from today and keep on going forward.”

 Edited by Osea Bola

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