The US’ history on rugby’s world stage can be summed up in two sentences.
Team USA took home the gold from both the 1920 and 1924 Olympics. And then, just like the Chicago Cubs, took the rest of the century off.
The timing could not be much better for a rare stateside visit from New Zealand’s storied All Blacks, who were to face the US Golden Eagles yesterday at sold-out Soldier Field (capacity: 61,500). Even though it is only an exhibition, the match will be televised nationally on NBC and provide a snapshot of where USA Rugby — after nearly a decade of investment and effort — stands on the road back to respectability.
Photo: AFP
The Golden Eagles have already qualified for next year’s World Cup and hope to do the same for the 2016 Summer Olympics, where rugby (the seven-a-side version, instead of 15 players each) will return as a medal sport for the first time since the US won. Despite those and other accomplishments in recent years, especially by the US women’s and youth teams, the key to enjoying yesterday’s match might be not to expect too much.
The All-Blacks are rugby’s 1927 Yankees, a dynasty who have claimed two of the seven World Cups played and have been almost unbeatable (34 wins, 2 draws and 2 losses) since coach Steve Hansen took over in 2012. They are fast, skilled, bruising, experienced, deep at every position and led by captain Richie McCaw, the most capped New Zealander of all-time and the game’s only three-time international player of the year.
The team’s pre-game haka, a Maori rite that resembles a line-dance with bad intentions, could turn out to be the highlight of the afternoon. If nothing else, US audiences might appreciate a game with every player handling the ball, no TV timeouts, an occasional scrum instead of huddles after every play and — relatively — lower-level violence.
The only suspense after kickoff figures to be the margin of New Zealand’s win. That will be determined in large part by how many of the squad’s senior players Hansen trots out, and for how long. After a promotional tour of Chicago, the All-Blacks cross the Atlantic and get down to business: facing more-traditional and much-tougher rivals England, Scotland and Wales on successive Saturdays.
Midfield back Conrad Smith, who has represented New Zealand 83 times, was asked to put the match-up in terms US sports fans could relate to.
He thought for a moment, smiled and said: “About the same as our basketball guys playing yours.”
New Zealand’s basketball ranking — No. 21 in the world — is almost on par with the US’ rugby perch — No. 18 — and the chance of an upset is about the same. Small wonder someone challenged US coach Mike Tolkin to come up with a “realistic” goal.
“To get the respect of our opponents,” he said. “If we walk off the field leaving our blood and guts out there, we’ll be satisfied.”
The stewards of the sport, though, are hoping for a bit more.
The sellout nearly tripled the previous attendance record for a stateside match and it represents rugby’s latest attempt to get a foothold in the lucrative, but already crowded US sports market.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier