Wellington Sevens Pool D: Young Maple Leafs called up for senior service

Berna and McCloskey (pictured right ) are products of Canada’s age-grade system having both have risen through the Canadian ranks to make the senior team.

“This is a great opportunity to expose these two players to the World Series and equally it’s an opportunity for them to show what they are good at,” said Middleton. “Both have been in our training programme for the last six months and played in several Maple Leafs tournaments. Luke is immensely fit, with good pace and Phil is an all-round good rugby player who adds a different dimension to our forwards.

“Importantly we are seeing players like Luke and Phil graduating through the Maple Leafs into the senior team which is a sign of our pathway really starting to push players through.”

McCloskey, 23, has been a mainstay on the Maple Leafs the past year. He played on two stops of the South Americas Sevens Circuit earlier this month while also playing in Dubai and Australia.

Berna, 19, also played for the Maple Leafs in Australia and Chile as well as in Limerick last year. He also helped Canada advance to the World Rugby U20 Trophy final last May in Portugal.

Nine retained

Nine players keep their place from Cape Town as John Moonlight will once again captain a side that also includes returnees Admir Cejvanovic, Sean Duke, Nathan Hirayama, Harry Jones, Pat Kay, Phil Mack, Matt Mullins and Sean White. Lucas Hammond and Adam Zaruba are also included.

“It’s hard not to associate the year 2016 with the Olympic games and our intention is to be the best prepared we can be for the qualifier in June, but right now our only focus is on the Wellington tournament and our first pool game. After that we will look at the next pool game,” added Middleton.

Canada has been drawn into Pool D with Australia, who they’ve only beaten three times in 40 attempts, and Kenya and Portugal. Canada has yet to face Australia and Kenya this season but did beat Portugal 31-14 in Dubai.

“We play Kenya a lot and they had a good run out in Cape Town,” said Middleton. “Australia are a consistently quality side and Portugal are a gritty team that are hard to get on top of. Every game will be as good a test as we would expect from any pool game and we prepare to play those games with one outcome in mind.”

After two rounds, Canada currently sits 13th in the series standings. They won the Shield in Dubai with a 19-17 win over Japan and then secured an 11th place finish in Cape Town that included some extremely positive results including a second-ever victory over New Zealand and an exciting 26-26 tie with France.

After the Wellington Sevens, Canada will head to Australia for the Sydney Sevens the following week. With a number of players unavailable for Wellington, including Nanyak Dala, Justin Douglas, Conor Trainor, Mike Fuailefau, Mitch Santilli and Liam Underwood, Middleton could potentially have a bigger pool of players to choose from for the fourth tournament of the series.

Canada squad: Phil Berna, Admir Cejvanovic, Sean Duke, Lucas Hammond, Nathan Hirayama, Harry Jones, Pat Kay, Luke McCloskey, John Moonlight (captain), Matt Mullins, Sean White, Adam Zaruba.

Photo: Iain Muir

Debuts for Aussie duo

The Australian men's sevens team will hand debuts to young forward Simon Kennewell and speedster John Porch for the third leg of the 2015-16 HSBC Sevens World Series in Wellington next weekend.

Porch, 24, earned a call-up to the national sevens squad after impressing in this year's National Rugby Championship for the North Harbour Rays and is a product of the Emerging Sevens system. Sydneysider Simon Kennewell, meanwhile, was a member of the Australian squad that won a silver medal in the 2015 Commonwealth Youth Games in Samoa last September.

Back-rower Sam Figg will add to his three World Series caps when he returns to the sevens arena for the first time since London in 2013 having signed a permanent deal with the centralised Australian sevens programme at the start of this year.

Interim head coach Scott Bowen has selected a relatively inexperienced squad for the trip to New Zealand's North Island with Henry Hutchison, Boyd Killingworth, Tom Kingston and Stefan Van Der Walt - all debutants this season - picked.

World series regulars James Stannard, playmaker Allan Fa'alava'au and outside back Greg Jeloudev (pictured) will also play at Westpac Stadium. Nick Malouf (knee), Pama Fou (shoulder) and Pat McCutcheon (hamstring) are both unavailable due to injury.

Australia, who are in eighth position in the standings after the first two rounds in Dubai and Cape Town, have been drawn in Pool D alongside Kenya, Canada and Portugal at the Wellington Sevens.

New Australian men's sevens head coach Andy Friend will assume a watching brief in Wellington before taking over the role permanently for the inaugural Sydney Sevens the following weekend.

"For us at the moment it is about three key considerations - managing the workloads of players in the programme as we look towards Rio, giving experience to all of the players in the squad while also looking to get World Series points on the board,” said Bowen.

"We're all looking forward to see how John [Porch] and Simon [Kennewell] - both of whom have come through national programmes - perform at the highest level, as well as the returning Sam Figg. Each of them are exciting talents in their own right, good characters and we think they can add something extra to the wider squad.

"With a new head coach watching on before taking over and players pushing for spots as we look towards the Olympics in August, I'm expecting to see plenty of hungry players who won't leave anything out on the pitch over the course of the two days in Wellington."

Australia men’s sevens squad: Henry Hutchison, Tom Kingston, Sam Myers, Tom Lucas, James Stannard, Simon Kennewell, Sam Figg, Greg Jeloudev, Boyd Killingworth, Allan Fa'alava'au, Stephan van der Walt, John Porch.

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Photo courtesy of the ARU