Cancellation spells end for Union’s domestic rugby in 2017

By Ulimasao Fata 06 December 2017, 12:00AM

Samoa’s domestic rugby season has ended prematurely, the Samoa Rugby Union announced yesterday.

It follows the cancellation of the Bluesky National 10s tournament last weekend due to bad weather.

Tournament director, Salesa Seiuli, confirmed that the cancellation was due to safety concerns.

“Player welfare and safety is paramount,” he said. “Therefore after an urgent team manager’s meeting between the organizing committee and the teams, we collectively agreed that the condition of the fields are not safe and agreed to cancel the games.”

But the Union yesterday issued another notice, this time cancelling all domestic rugby for the rest of 2017.

“This is an Official Notice to all participating teams, stake holders and service providers; the Bluesky National 10’s Tournament is officially cancelled.

“The two rounds allocated for 10’s tournaments will be supplemented to two rounds of 7s tournaments which are now transferred from December 2017 to January 2018, as preparation for the Manu 7s towards the Sydney 7s (26-28 Jan) and Hamilton 7s (3-4 Feb).

“As such, we ardently apologise for the inconvenience caused.

“With the cancellation of the Bluesky 10s Tournament, this completes a huge year for domestic rugby competitions in Samoa.

“We like thank our tournament sponsor Bluesky for making our national tournaments possible along with the Bluesky Marketing Team for their constant support week in week out. We also like to thank all the teams (officials & players), referees and volunteers who have worked with us from the start.

“We thank the Police Department for providing security, Red Cross for first aid and ambulance assistance and SSFA for the venue every Saturday.  

“Lastly we thank the TV1 Crew for bringing all the matches into every living room in Samoa creating a larger scope and awareness or our domestic competitions, which was starkly proven in the Super 9 Rugby Championship with massive interest from fans which translated to massive spectator numbers throughout the Super 9 season especially the Semi Finals and Finals.” 

The last event for the year will be a Super 9 Review Workshop scheduled for Friday 15 December 2017 at the S.R.U Office, Tuanaimato.

By Ulimasao Fata 06 December 2017, 12:00AM
Samoa Observer

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