2023 U20 Trophy winners Spain have safeguarded their World Rugby Championship status for 2025 after dramatically relegating Fiji with a 24-19 sudden death win in Athlone. The Fijians ultimately paid a heavy price for card trouble, suffering three yellows and one red over the course of an exhausting 93 minutes of play.
Just when the match had been restored to a 15-vs-15 contest, they were unable to put a stop to a rampant Spanish maul that ended on 92:56 with the referee Federico Vedovelli awarding the golden try to replacement hooker David Gallego.
The outcome meant that Spain, promoted for the first time following their success in Kenya last July, will prolong their top-flight stay and the place of Fiji will now be taken in 2025 by Scotland, who were crowned 2024 Trophy champions after beating the USA in the Edinburgh final on Wednesday.
Both Spain and Fiji came into the 11th/12th place play-off having lost all four matches so far at the Championship, the Spanish losing to France, Wales, New Zealand and Italy while the Fijians gave second best to South Africa, England, Argentina and Georgia.
In a brutally even contest played on a soft Athlone pitch, the first half was scoreless for 32 minutes. Spain thought they were going to get the breakthrough as pressure on the Fiji line resulted in the yellow carding of Moses Armstrong-Ravula.
However, that 28th-minute sin-binning instead revved up the Fijians who ‘won’ the 10 minutes a man short 14-0. A sweet pop pass from Malakai Masi had openside Ronald Sharma racing to the line from 30 metres out, and sub hooker Iowane Vakadrigi then powered his way in under the posts from five metres.
The irony, though, was that the Fijians conceded when restored to their full complement, Spain mauling their way forward off a lineout drive over to enable Diego Gonzalez Blanco to score the 39thminute unconverted try.
Despite the weather deteriorating on the resumption, Fiji struck 12 minutes into the second half with an unconverted try when full-back Isikeli Basiyalo joined the line to create the overlap that Ratu Nemani Kurucake took advantage of by diving in at the corner.
Their 19-5 advantage was quickly reduced, though, as Spain enjoyed more maul dominance and it laid the platform for some resulting pick-and-go that ended with Jokin Zolezzi going in under the posts for the easily converted try.
With seven points now separating the teams, it started bucketing down and Spain upped the ante. Fiji went a man down again, Sharma going to the bin on 68 minutes, and the Spanish immediately thought they had a try in the corner from Julien Burguillos when play restarted.
However, TMO spotted a knock-on at the scrum from No8 Valentino Rizzo, which cancelled the score. A head contact tackle was also picked up against Fiji winger Waisake Salabiau, reducing them to 13 players. Salabiau’s yellow was quickly upgraded to red and the two-player difference was costly.
Nicolas Moleti grabbed a 71st-minute pick-and-go try that was converted by Luciano Richardis to level the scores at 19-all, but Spain couldn’t grab the winner, normal time ending with them held up over the line after they kicked a penalty to the corner rather than shoot at the uprights.
Fiji soon lost Basiyalo to an extra time yellow card for a deliberate knock-on, but some poor Spanish handling kept the Islanders alive and they tried to grab the win with an ambitious 87th penalty kick from near the touchline just short of halfway.
The attempt by Aisea Nawai never threatened the target and it left the door open for Spain to strike for glory three minutes into the second period of extra time following a wonderful touch finder from Richardis.
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