What's happening
Samoa - Uruguay

October 15 Match

WHAT'S HAPPENING? (posted 15th October 2003)
Subiaco Oval in Perth was the scene of another rugby pool game massacre this evening when Samoa thumped Uruguay 60-13 in their Pool C clash. While the Samoans had a try fest- 10 tries to Uruguay's two, their performance overall was more like a team of stars than a star team if you know what I mean. I doubt whether England or South Africa are quaking in their tagged boots after this game.

The game started off fairly slowly for the first ten minutes but then Maurie Fa'asavalu, a Samoan flanker, barrelled half way up the field to score the first try of the game. He was followed closely by Brian Lima who also went over for a five pointer. When Uruguay's singer Joaquin Pastore slipped over while trying to keep the ball in play Samoa's Tagicakibau swiped the ball and headed off to under the posts. Uh oh.. things weren't going well for Uruguay! But, the Samoan boys were on a roll and with barely a half an hour of football gone by Fa'asavalu scored his second try to give Samoa their 4 try bonus point for the game.

Lima got in on the try scoring action for a second time as well, but finally Uruguay's Rodrigo Capo, landed one over the try line! And didn't he enjoy it! :)

The second half saw more of the same from Samoa. Try... after try... after try. I guess they got kind of bored with all that scoring because they slacked off in the last twenty minutes of the game. To their credit, Uruguay used this reprieve to get together some phases of play, but the exercise was one in futility. Samoa was waaaaaaay ahead. Fa'atau, who earlier scored a try for Samoa got sin binned near the end of the match after a late tackle. It's a bit sad that the incident occurred - so late in the match, and so little to gain for Samoa.

The Samoans next match will be against Georgia in Perth on Sunday, and after that they'll have the big boys to play against. They'll need to work on some 'team work' between now and then! Uruguay, one of the minnows of the tournament have had two very tough games in a short space of time. Pity the game scheduling couldn't have afforded them some more time between games.