Cape Town — The Springbok Sevens side overcame a plucky Scotland to progress to the Cup semi-finals of the Seville Sevens on Saturday night.
It was a thrilling match in which the Scots were clearly determined to prove a point, but in the end, the Blitzboks showed why they are at the top of the Sevens world.
Scotland scored the opener to go 7-0 up, but the Blitzboks were quick to respond after some magic by Justin Geduld, with Shaun Williams visiting the Scots’ in-goal area to level the scores (7-7).
Scotland made their intentions clear and ran in a second (7-12), before Sako Makata made sure that the South Africans take the lead (14-12).
The Springbok Sevens side capitalised on their numerical advantage after a Scottish player was sin-binned, and Ryan Oosthuizen crossed over for an unconverted try to take the score to 19-12 at the break.
The Blitzboks wasted no time in the second half and were first on the scoresheet after Selvyn Davids scored from a turnover (24-12).
Scotland, though, stayed in it and closed in on the Series champions’ margin by scoring a long-range try (24-19). Davids, though, got his brace in the last minute of the game (31-19).
Just as they had done throughout the whole game, Scotland hit back again to grab one last try and end the game on 31-24.