“We’re looking at putting a celebration together”, added the prime minister. “But the last few years have been incredible and I’ll always be thankful for helping Fiji find my fire again”.
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This humbleness masks the fact that rugby sevens is Fiji’s national sport, and that the team already have superstar status in their country.
Ryan said: “I am very happy for the boys”.
Fiji’s English coach Ben Ryan, who will now step down from the role, said: “We did say we wanted to show people the way to play the Fijian way”.
“These boys are on the front page, back page of newspapers, on the six o’clock news”.
In the rugby-obsessed island nation, the gold medal victory was also seen as a chance to put behind them the memories of four coups over the past 30 years of political upheaval.
The South Pacific island country came to a standstill at the start of the rugby sevens final against Great Britain, and by half-time the fireworks had started and there was a monumental chorus of auto horns as it became evident Fiji would win and create history.
In the last minute, the Fijians sealed the historic win in their national sport with a try by Viliame Mata.
“We’ll probably wake up tomorrow, it will dawn on us – this achievement will be part of our history back home”.
The Fijians scored twice more in the second half – the only blemish being Dan Norton’s try. “We are all grateful because it means a lot to the nation not just in terms of sports, but what it does for the morale and spirit of the people with what we have been through with Cyclone Winston earlier this year”. Fiji targeted the “branches, not roots” of the British team to avoid being sucked into a contact game.
Ryan said it time and again – only gold would do for the expectant public in their Pacific island country of 900,000.
Jerry Tuwai followed soon after with Britain s defence failing to cope with the Pacific islanders off-loading brilliance.
National carrier Fiji Airways said it would be serving only Fijian beer on its flights in in a gesture of celebration.
Since then, the Fijians have won the last two world series and in Rio they produced a string of sevens masterclasses, going through the tournament unbeaten to claim their country’s first Olympic medal.
“I feel very lucky I am in charge of such an unbelievable group of athletes with a country behind us that is passionate about Rugby sevens”.
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Rugby last appeared as the 15-man version of the men’s game at the 1924 Olympics but returned in the shorter sevens format for men and women in Brazil, staging a competition which would decide its future in the Olympic line up.
