Rio 2016 is done and dusted, as far as the Greater Victoria-based Canadian men鈥檚 and women鈥檚 rugby sevens national teams are concerned.
They put to rest the last quadrennial and Wednesday laid out the blueprint for the next one, leading to the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics.
It begins at the Dubai Sevens from Dec. 1-3, with the Canadian men鈥檚 and women鈥檚 rosters named.
The Rio Olympic bronze-medallist Canadian women conducted their final practice Wednesday afternoon at the Pacific Institute for Sport Excellence on the Camosun College Interurban campus before departing today for Dubai.
Canadian head coach John Tait said he is not worried about any post-Rio letdown after reaching the Olympic podium.
鈥淲e sweated out the Rio hangover the past few weeks during training camp at PISE,鈥� he said.
鈥淲e feel invigorated.鈥�
A core group of nine Rio Olympic medallists are going to Dubai. They include Bianca Farella, Ashley Steacy, Hannah Darling, Britt Benn, Kayla Moleschi, Ghislaine Landry, Charity Williams, Megan Lukan and Natasha Watcham-Roy.
Jenn Kish, in many ways the face of the team and who captained sa国际传媒 to the 2016 Olympic bronze medal, is injured and out until early next year. The speedster Landry will captain sa国际传媒 through the 2016-17 season.
鈥淭his is a good returning group,鈥� said Tait.
鈥淏ut many players will be in new positions as we are reshaping the team. Attacking will be more hybrid across the field as opposed to the power-attacking model we have used. The way the sport is going, by 2020 at Tokyo, you are going to see players who can do it all and play any position. We have to get a start on that.鈥�
The newcomers are Julia Greenshields, Sara Kaljuvee and Breanne Nichols.
鈥淭hey have been given an opportunity to step up,鈥� said Tait.
The Canadian men failed to qualify for the Rio Olympics and begin the Tokyo quadrennial ranked No. 13 in the world under new head coach Damian McGrath.
Named to the team for the Dubai Sevens are Pat Kay of Duncan, Mike Fuailefau and Luke McCloskey, both of Victoria, team veteran and UVic Vikes-grad Nathan Hirayama, Phil Berna, Karsten Leitner, Adam Zaruba and Harry Jones, all of Vancouver, Justin Douglas of Abbotsford, Caleb Jordan of Montreal, Matt Mullins of Belleville, Ont., Liam Underwood of Toronto and returning captain John Moonlight from James Bay.
Perhaps fitting for a new cycle, sa国际传媒鈥檚 first game in Dubai is against defending Rio Olympic gold-medallist Fiji.
鈥淲e get to play the reigning Olympic champions in our first game, so we get to pit ourselves against the best,鈥� said an undaunted McGrath.
鈥淚t鈥檒l certainly give us an indicator of where we are and what we need to do. I鈥檓 confident we鈥檒l put up a good performance.鈥�
Both the 10-event men鈥檚 and six-event women鈥檚 2016-17 World Series seasons will feature Canadian stops. The men鈥檚 HSBC sa国际传媒 Sevens is March 11-12 at sa国际传媒 Place in Vancouver and women鈥檚 HSBC sa国际传媒 Sevens is May 27-28 at Westhills Stadium in Langford.
Rugby sa国际传媒 said on Wednesday that 85 per cent of the 33,000 seats per day for the men鈥檚 tournament at sa国际传媒 Place have already been sold and more than 33 per cent of the 3,000 seats per day for the women鈥檚 tournament at Westhills are sold. Tickets are available at canadasevens.com.
RUGBY NOTES: The world No. 2 Canadian women鈥檚 XVs, now featuring Olympic bronze-medallists Kelly Russell and Karen Paquin who have switched from the sevens game, lost 20-10 to the world top-ranked New Zealand Black Ferns on Wednesday in Dublin.
