- France men and Australia women crowned HSBC SVNS 2024 Champions at Grand Final in Madrid
- France beat Argentina 19-5 in a pulsating men’s final, with Fiji winning bronze
- Australia overcome France 26-7 to claim women’s gold, while New Zealand take bronze
- USA, Kenya, Uruguay and Spain secure men’s HSBC SVNS 2025 status with Play Off victories
- China, Spain, Japan and Brazil earn places on women’s HSBC SVNS 2025 with Qualifier wins
- France’s Antoine Dupont and Canada’s Carissa Norsten win SVNS 2024 ‘Rookie of the Year’ awards, while Ireland’s Terry Kennedy and Australia’s Maddison Levi are top try scorers
- Olympic Repechage takes place in Monaco on 21-23 June before rugby sevens kicks off the Olympic Games Paris 2024 in Stade de France on 24 July
At the end of the most drama-filled, high stakes rugby sevens event in history, France men and Australia women were crowned HSBC SVNS 2024 Champions at the inaugural Grand Final in Madrid.
France will enter their home Olympic Games full of confidence after a stunning 19-5 victory over Argentina in the men’s final, denying the HSBC SVNS 2024 League Winners the double in Madrid.
Having broken their 19-year cup drought with their victory in Vancouver, France scored two second half tries to seal victory as Argentina’s Rodrigo Isgro was shown a late red card for an illegal tackle.
Elsewhere, a resurgent Fiji beat New Zealand for the second time this weekend to win bronze, equalling their best result of the season with the Olympics on the horizon.
Australia claimed the women’s title as a Maddison Levi hattrick helped her side beat France 26-7 for their first cup win since Cape Town in December.
Australia, who were HSBC SVNS League frontrunners almost all season before losing out to arch rivals New Zealand at the last round in Singapore, were the outstanding team all weekend in Madrid, seeing off New Zealand 21-19 in a thrilling semi-final comeback.
The Blacks Ferns Sevens would go on to beat Canada 26-14 to secure the bronze medal, revenge for their loss to the same opponents in the pool stage.
The newly introduced promotion and relegation Play Off competition featured teams ranked ninth to twelfth in SVNS 2024 competing with the top four teams from the World Rugby HSBC Sevens Challenger 2024.
In the men’s HSBC SVNS Play-Offs, Samoa and Canada lost their places on the HSBC SVNS series as the USA and Spain retained their own with victories. Kenya and Uruguay will join them after successfully gaining promotion from the Challenger Series with wins over Germany and Chile respectively.
The women’s play-offs saw China victorious and they will replace South Africa on the SVNS Series next season as the newcomers defeated Belgium 33-0 in their qualifier final, while South Africa fell to a 22-0 defeat at the hands of hosts Spain. Brazil produced a dominant performance to beat Poland 38-7 while Japan overcame Argentina 26-12 to retain their places on HSBC SVNS 2025.
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The losing teams from the Play Off will enter the regional qualification pathway for the World Rugby HSBC Sevens Challenger 2025.
Australia’s Maddison Levi said: “We’re finally getting some pay for our hard work which is good. It’s so close to the Olympics, we’re finally building. Having not beaten New Zealand since Perth, it’s always a tough battle between the two and I think for it to finally just click and just to work hard, it just proves that we’ve got it.”
“I think they’ve done really well with the structure. Sevens is a rollercoaster and unfortunately you can’t peak all the time being an athlete. We have full trust and full faith in our coaches and I think what they’re doing out there, it’s really showing on the field. The willingness and the courage for each and every one to dig deep at training – we call it ‘cronning.’ The hard work, sweat and tears is able to put on performances like that out here.”
France captain Pauline Riva said: “I’m very proud of the team today, especially the amazing young players. We had a big defence tonight. The atmosphere and our supporters were amazing tonight. We can feel the Olympics are arriving now.
On the impact of Antoine Dupont: “We think Antoine Dupont is the best player in the world and when he is on the pitch we have a lot of confidence and we are all very happy today.”
A number of HSBC SVNS Awards winners were announced on Sunday following the thrilling finals. Four prestigious awards were handed out to the standout players that have had exceptional performances across the competition.
All eyes were on SVNS’s newcomers for the hotly contested Rookie of the Year award that recognises and celebrates the men’s and women’s player that have made the biggest impact since debuting in the series for the 2023/24 series.
The Men’s Rookie of the Year Award went to France’s Antoine Dupont. The European Champions Cup victory last week was not enough for Antoine Dupont, who took one more coveted award with him from Madrid. His debut season has been nothing short of spectacular, joining in Vancouver and contributing significantly to his team’s three medal successes in the events he has played. The rugby world eagerly awaits Dupont’s inauguration at the Olympics Games this summer.
On receiving the HSBC SVNS Rookie of the Year award Dupont said: ““I was honestly a bit worried before my first tournament, so I tried to work very hard to be ready for Vancouver and Los Angeles but there was a very good team spirit in the team so it was easy to join them.”
On excitement building for the Olympics he added: “I hope it will be a huge tournament for us. Obviously we want to win, but we’re not the only team, so we have two months to work as hard as we can to be ready and to try and lift the trophy in July.”
Canada’s Carissa Norsten won the women’s Rookie of the Year Award. Norsten has been a standout player since the start of the 2024 series, consistently showcasing her skill and speed. The future is bright for the 20-year-old who will no doubt play a big role for Canada in years to come.
Ireland’s Terry Kennedy led the HSBC SVNS 2024 try scoring chart with an impressive 32 tries across the eight events and received the Gilbert Top Try Scorer award in Madird.
Meanwhile the highest Gilbert try scorer of the series goes to Australia’s Maddison Levi with a record-breaking 65 tries in what is her third season of the HSBC SVNS Series and at only 22 years old. This is the second year running for Levi who broke her own record last year of 57 tries.
A noisy and enthusiastic crowd of more than 50,000 fans were treated to a feast of entertainment on and off the pitch over three days at the famous Civitas Metropolitano Stadium, home of Athletico Madrid.
Today’s action brings down the curtain on an epic inaugural HSBC SVNS, which featured seven regular-season events in Dubai, Cape Town, Perth, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Hong Kong and Singapore and resulted in Argentina and New Zealand becoming men’s and women’s league winners, before the new standalone Grand Final in Madrid.
World Rugby Chief Executive Alan Gilpin said: “HSBC SVNS 2024 has surely been the most high quality and hotly contested season in history. Today’s inaugural Grand Final in Madrid showcased the very best of rugby sevens with more excitement, jeopardy and entertainment than ever before on a single day of sevens.
“Congratulations to SVNS Champions Australia and France and to all the eight teams that secured their status on HSBC SVNS 2025 with victory in the Play Off finals today. Our thanks and gratitude to our excellent hosts in Madrid, and to our title partner HSBC for their unwavering support.
“We now look forward to what promises to be a blockbuster Olympic Games for rugby sevens, with just 52 days to go until our sport has the honour of kicking off the Games on 24 July, two days ahead of the Opening Ceremony, in a packed Stade de France, which will no doubt have an electrifying atmosphere to welcome some of the fittest, fastest, strongest and most skilful athletes in the world.”
The twelfth and final men’s and women’s spot in the Olympic Games will be decided at the Olympic Repechage in Monaco on 21-23 June, before all attention turns to the Olympic Games in Paris.
Credit: HSBC SVNS