Fiji will fly the Pacific flag for sevens rugby at the 2016 Rio Olympics in August.

This came after island nations Samoa and Tonga failed to qualify during the Monaco Sevens yesterday.

The upsets

The Tongans failed to qualify for the Cup quarterfinals. Samoa was favourite to win the repechage event after winning the Paris leg of the 2015-2016 World Sevens Series.

But Spain upset the odds to defeat top seed Samoa 22-19 in a dramatic fi nal to book the fi nal men’s place at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

Both Spain and Samoa came to Fiji early this year to prepare for the sevens season.

The three Olympic sevens groups have been decided based on the World Sevens Series standings over the past two years.

Being the champion in the last two years, Fiji will lead Pool A , South Africa Pool B and New Zealand leads Pool C.

While rugby draws for the Olympics will be done after the final repechage for women in Dublin this weekend, the Ben Ryan –coached team are likely to be grouped with Argentina, USA and Brazil while Great Britain, Spain and Japan join South Africa in Pool B.

Sir Gordon Tietjens’ Kiwis are likely to face Australia, Kenya and France.

Meanwhile, the Vodafone Fijian 7s team began their second week of Olympic preparation at the Uprising Beach Resort yesterday.

France-based Semi Kunatani trained with the team after he arrived last Friday while Josua Tuisova will join the team next week.

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