The USA were similarly commanding in their 33-7 win against Fiji, but Australia were made to work hard for a 12-0 victory over a determined Japan to set up a mouth-watering Trans-Tasman contest with the Black Ferns Sevens.
The eighth and final spot will be decided at the seventh and last regular season round in Singapore, but current eighth seed Great Britain will face ninth-seed Brazil tomorrow in the 9th place play-off in a crucial contest for that place in Madrid.
Further down in the results, Australia, the current Series leaders, secured the fourth position. Following closely, USA claimed the fifth spot, while Fiji and Spain secured the sixth and seventh positions, respectively. Brazil landed in eighth place, Ireland in ninth, Japan in tenth, Great Britain in eleventh, and South Africa finished twelfth in the overall standings.
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Argentina won the men's title for the second straight event, beating Australia 31-5. The Pumas opened the 2024 season by finishing runner-up in Dubai before winning in Cape Town and have reached the final in eight of the last nine events (with a 4-4-0 record in those championship games).
The Irish women went 5-1-0 in Perth, losing only to New Zealand in pool play (21-14). Ireland downed the U.S. and Japan in the group stage before dispatching Fiji 14-12 in the quarterfinal and Britain 31-7 in the semifinal to reach the championship game.
Argentina tops the men's table with 58 points ahead of Fiji and Australia (both on 44) and South Africa and Ireland (both 42). The Canadian men have 10 points, one point ahead of bottom-placed Britain.
Krissy Scurfield, Olivia Apps, Charity Williams and Asia Hogan-Rochester scored tries in Canada's win over Japan in the seventh-place playoff. Chloe Daniels kicked two conversions and Hogan-Rochester booted one for Canada, which led 12-0 at the half.
The HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series has been rebranded as the HSBC SVNS this season. The slimmed-down sevens circuit features seven regular-season events, each featuring men's and women's competition, plus a grand final in Madrid with promotion and relegation at stake.
Hideki Matsuyama never gave anyone a chance on Sunday, closing with a 6-under 66 for a seven-shot victory that made him the first Asian to win a World Golf Championships event since the series began in 1999.Matsuyama finished at 23-under 265, one short of the tournament record that Dustin Johnson set three years ago.His victory margin of seven shots is the largest in tournament history,and the largest in a WGC since Tiger Woods won by seven in the 2013 WGC-Bridgestone Invitational.
Russell Knox, who started out as a seventh alternate for the WGC-HSBC Champions 2015, beat all odds to win the 11th edition of the tournament by two stroke margin over a star-studded field which included the likes of Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy, Bubba Watson and Rickie Fowler. His decision to finish off round 3 on Sunday due to low visibility was one of the title deciders as he birdied the 18th on the following day, which set him off for a 4-under-par final round to become the first Scott to win the tournament.
2012 saw the WGC-HSBC Champions move away from Sheshan for the first time, to Mission Hills Golf Club in Shenzhen. Ian Poulter won the title by two strokes, beating runners-up Jason Dufner, Ernie Els, Phil Mickelson and Scott Piercy. Poulter trailed by nine shots after the first two days, but closed very strongly with two rounds of 65, giving him a 21-under-par total of 267. That score proved enough to secure Poulter his second WGC in three years, following his victory at the World Match Play.
Phil Mickelson won the first of his two HSBC Champions in 2007 at Sheshan Golf Club, coming through a three-way playoff with Englishmen Ross Fisher and Lee Westwood, having finished the 72nd hole tied on a ten-under-par score of 278. On a bizarre final day Mickelson overcame six penalty strokes, blew a three-shot lead with seven to play and still came out victorious, birdying the second playoff hole to win the title.
The 2006 HSBC Champions, again held at Sheshan, was won by South Korean Yang Yong-Eun by 2 strokes. As in the previous year, Tiger Woods was near the top of the leaderboard and was looking to win his seventh consecutive strokeplay event, but he was once again resigned to second place by another stunning performance by a relative rookie. A three-under-par final round of 69, and a fourteen-under-par total of 274, handed Yang one of the biggest wins of his career.
The Canadian men now head to Madrid for the final event of the season May 31 to June 2, joining the ninth-placed U.S., No. 10 Spain and No. 11 Samoa in a relegation playoff with the top four teams from the World Rugby HSBC Sevens Challenger Series.
The fifth-ranked Canadian women finished seventh in Singapore, closing out with a 17-5 win over Britain on Sunday. Charity Williams scored two of the tries with Alysha Corrigan added a single. Chloe Daniels added a conversion.
The relegation bracket in Madrid, featuring the bottom four teams in the SVNS standings and the top four from the World Rugby HSBC Sevens Challenger series, will determine the remaining four HSBC SVNS core teams.
Michaela Blyde scored three tries to help the New Zealand women defeat Australia 31-21 in the Singapore final and finish atop the season standings with 126 points, two ahead of Australia. It marked the fourth straight tournament win for the New Zealand women and their sixth podium in seven events.
Knox became the first player to win a World Golf Championship in his debut when the 30-year-old from Scotland was flawless on the back nine of Sheshan International and closed with a 4-under 68 for a two-shot victory over Kevin Kisner.
Knox only found out a week ago Friday that he was in the HSBC Champions as an alternate when J.B. Holmes withdrew. He was in Malaysia and had to scramble to get a Chinese visa, arriving in time for one practice round with his wife, Andrea, as his caddie.
Li Haotong, the 20-year-old from China who felt like a rock star all week, faded quickly with a bogey-double bogey start. But he kept it entertaining the whole way around and at least achieved his goal of finishing in the top 10. Li saved par on the 18th hole for a 72 to tie for seventh, the highest finish ever by a Chinese player in a PGA Tour event.
Jordan Spieth, starting the final round three shots behind, never got anything going. Two birdies on the back nine at least allowed him to post a 70 and tie for seventh, enough for the 22-year-old Texan to return to No. 1 in the world.
Danny Willett of England closed with a 62 and was briefly tied for the lead. He tied for third with Ross Fisher (68), but at least made up significant ground on Rory McIlroy in the Race to Dubai on the European Tour. McIlroy, who closed with a 66 and tied for 11th, is not playing the BMW Masters next week in Shanghai. That means the Race to Dubai will be settled in the final event at the DP World Championship in Dubai.
Dustin Johnson had a 71 and finished four shots behind, though he will look back at one great shot that cost him. One shot behind Knox on the par-5 eighth, Johnson hit a wedge that looked as though it would land a few feet behind the cup for a tap-in birdie. Instead, it hit the pin and caromed hard off the green and down into a creek, turning a sure birdie into a double bogey. He never quite recovered.
His day started early, and it paid off. Knox chose not to finish the third round Saturday evening because of darkness, instead returning in the morning chill to play the par-5 18th. He hit wedge to 3 feet for birdie to tie Kisner for the 54-hole lead.
The only sign of a struggle came when he missed a 3-foot birdie putt on No. 8 and then failed to get up-and-down for par on the ninth. He was tied for the lead at 17 under with Willett, Fisher, Kisner and Branden Grace, but not for long. He made a 10-foot birdie at No. 10 and another birdie on the 11th.
The clincher came at the reachable par-4 16th. Knox hit iron off the tee, wedge some 12 feet behind the flag and clenched his fist when it dropped for birdie. That gave him a three-shot lead with two holes to play, and he kept it clean.
Knox grew up in Inverness and attended Jacksonville University in Florida. It took him five years to reach the PGA Tour, and he has been steadily improving. His only other close call was a four-man playoff in the 2014 Honda Classic that included McIlroy and was won by Russell Henley.
The rebuilding Canadian men, who had to deal with injuries in Hong Kong, have collected a minimum one-point in five of the first six events. They have now have lost 20 straight games since defeating France 33-7 on Dec. 10 to finish seventh in Cape Town.
After winning their pool with three straight wins, the Canadian women ran into a New Zealand buzz in a 26-5 loss in the Cup quarterfinal. Canada then fell short in its comeback bid against Fiji after trailing 19-5 in the second half of the fifth-place playoff. Piper Logan and Fancy Bermudez scored late tries but it was too little too late.
Canada, featuring four Series debutantes on its roster, finished last in Pool A after comprehensive losses to Fiji, France and Australia. Canada then lost 21-0 to Series leader Argentina in the ninth-place semifinal.
The high-flying Pumas, who have won three tournaments with one runner-up finish this season, came to Hong Kong with a 20-point lead in the overall standings. But they dropped into the consolation bracket after pool losses to the U.S. and New Zealand.
The Argentines, who lost Series try-scoring leader Marcos Moneta to injury in the U.S. loss, had reached the Cup final in seven of the past eight events dating back to Singapore last season and dispatched Canada 21-0.
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