England Sevens finished third in the opening HSBC Sevens World Series tournament in the Gold Coast after beating South Africa in the third place play-off.
England beat New Zealand in the quarter-finals 31-7 but lost to the eventual winners Fiji in the semi-finals (48-7).
A podium finish was still on the cards though and like last year, Simon Amor’s men rallied to beat the Blitzbokke in the play-off 19-0 thanks to two tries from Dan Norton and one from Alex Gray.
Amor said: “They team played a really good game against New Zealand, and I was really pleased for them. The team had fought hard on day one and they responded well today.
“The way Fiji played with their off-loading game it was so difficult to beat which was disappointing. But mentally for the team to pick themselves back up and to beat a very good South African side, it showed a lot about the mental toughness of the group, so overall I am pleased.
“It is a solid, good and positive start, and with a couple of guys coming back from injury, I hope that we can build on this. But the importance is we have to continue to take steps forward as a programme.
“You can see already by the standard of the tournament, that this series is going to be so tough this season. We came third in the Gold Coast last year and third again this year which is good but we want to take another step forward.”
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