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• Australia beat England in first pool match at International Rugby Sevens Adelaide

The International Rugby Sevens Adelaide kicked off under lights at Adelaide Oval this evening.

This is the third installment of this prestigious, fast-paced tournament which sees 16 nations go head to head across 44 gruelling matches and three action-packed days.

After a string of solid performances on the current IRB Sevens World Series, the Australian Sevens team has had a good start to their Adelaide campaign by downing England 21-17 in their first pool match.

England is currently ranked second behind South Africa on the World Series ladder.

“I am pretty satisfied that we have beaten one of the top nations,” Michael O’Connor, the Australian coach said.” England are a very good side and they showed at 14-nill down that they are never out of the game. They compete at the breakdown, they compete in the air and you can’t take your eye off them for a second.”

In the first half Australia displayed a lot of control and Henry Vanderglas was pinpointed by O’Connor as a strong force for the Australian side.

At the break the score was 14-12 to Australia.

In the second half Australia’s game got a little sloppy.

“A couple of things happened - players tripped over and our defensive line looked a bit crooked, which England took advantage of,” O’Connor said.

England scored a try at around the 6 minute mark which put them in the lead with only minutes remaining in the match.

“I am an optimist. Two minutes is a long time in Sevens and I was particularly happy with our chase to keep the kickers out on the side line and that meant we had a two point lead,” said O’Connor. “The way the scoring was going, if we scored the final try, which was possible - we could get up and fortunately that is what happened.”

Shaun Foley scored the winning try for Australia and Richard Kingi converted it.

Despite England's loss, O’Connor still believes that they are still a force in this tournament and Tom Varndell is a threat from anywhere on the field and can not be given space.

Tomorrow Australia will play Samoa in their second pool match at 1.21pm Adelaide time 1.51pm Sydney time.

Australia 21 (Domonic Shipperley, Shaun Foley, Luke Morahan tries; Richard Kingi (3) cons) defeated England 17 (Ollie Phillips (2), Tom Varndell tries; Ben Golling con).

For other match results please refer below:

International Rugby Sevens Adelaide 2009 Pools and Tournament Results