Flying Fijians set for final clash against Japan

The Flying Fijians are bracing for a tough encounter against Japan in the next week’s Pacific Nations Cup grand-final. 

Flying Fijians captain Tevita Ikanivere after their 63-10 win over Canada in the semi-final at Denver, Colorado, yesterday rated the Eddie Jones coached-Japanese side as a ‘quality team’. 

“Japan is a good team,” Ikanivere said. 

Similar sentiment was echoed by elusive centre Kalaveti Ravouvou who was named Player of the Match. 

Ikanivere said the plan for the Canada match was to ‘hunt them down’. 

‘We talked about it the whole week that Canada is going to come at us and we’ve to hunt them down and that is what we did.” 

However, in a sour note tighthead prop Mesake Doge will miss the grand-final after he was red carded for a controversial tackle, which TMO officials termed as dangerous. 

Japan walloped Tonga 62-24 in the first semi-final. 

The Flying Fijians led 43-3 at halftime. 

In a last minute reshuffle, the Flying Fijians started Kemu Valetini at No.10 after losing veteran centre Seta Tamanivalu due to a rib injury in the second minute. This allowed former Fiji men’s rugby sevens winger Jioji Nasova to make this Test debut while Kalaveti Ravouvou moved back to his centre position. 

In the third minute, Valetini’s grubber kick behind the Canadian defence enabled Taniela Rakuro to pounce on the ball to score the first try. Valetini added the extras for a 7-0 lead. 

In the 6th minute Canada converted a penalty to narrow the deficit 7-3. 

However, the Fijians kept moving the ball with their off-loads with Ravouvou delivering the final pass to Mesake Vocevoce to score the second try while Valetini kicked over the conversion to extend the lead to 14-3. 

Blindside flanker Eto Waqa was in top form with his strong defence and ability to burst through the Canadian tackles to score a try, with Valetini’s conversion making it 21-3. He against converted a penalty to push Fiji further ahead 24-3. 

Then Ravouvou, Eroni Mawi and Rakuro scored tries with Valetini landing two conversions to make 43-3. 

In the second half Fiji played with 13-men after Waqa was yellow carded. 

Then Nasova scored his first Test try with Ravouvou dotting down a double with Valetini kicking over a conversion and a penalty. 

Meanwhile, USA beat Samoa 29-13 to book a spot at the Rugby World Cup 2027 in Australia. Samoa now has to play in a World Rugby qualifying repechage.