Maddison Levi has been hailed as Australian rugby’s “cheat code” after her extraordinary tour de force piloted the women’s World Series champions to a season-opening triumph in the Dubai Sevens.
Levi, fresh from being voted the women’s world sevens player of the year, celebrated with a record-breaking weekend haul of 15 tries as Australia opened up their series defence with a thrilling 28-24 final triumph over Olympic champions New Zealand.
Alas for the Australians, under the new captaincy of Bella Nasser, Sunday’s victory – their fifth-straight triumph in Dubai – came four months later than planned following their huge Olympic disappointment in Paris when the favourites were left crestfallen not to even land a medal.
“It’s pretty incredible. I’m lost for words with how I feel right now, like, I’m on the verge of tears, but also laughing and so happy,” said Nasser.
Australia’s women’s sevens team celebrate taking out the Dubai Sevens on December 01, 2024 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (Photo by Christopher Pike/Getty Images)
“I’m so proud of the girls.”
Levi’s incredible performance, capped by the winning length-of-the-field intercept score in the final, also helped them put the record straight in the 39-0 quarter-final win over Canada, who had sensationally beaten them in the Olympic semis.
After scoring a hat-trick against China, four against Fiji and two against Ireland on Saturday, the unstoppable Levi rattled up another treble against the Canadians and two more in the 35-7 semi-final win over Great Britain.
Then, with the New Zealanders leading 24-21 with just three minutes left in the final, the 22-year-old Levi, after a tough final in which she’d been caught out a couple of times at restarts, latched on to a stray pass near her own line and galloped 80 metres to the line for the match-winner.
Watching her destructive performance, Wallabies’ great Matt Giteau was left tweeting on X: “Maddi Levi is a genuine cheat code.”
Her 15 tries in one tournament beat the record of 14 set by New Zealand great Portia Woodman in Atlanta in 2015. Levi now has 167 tries in her World Series career, on target to race past Woodman’s record career mark of 256.
But she wasn’t the only Australian stand-out, with her sister Teagan Levi scoring a try in the final along with Faith Nathan, who nabbed seven over the weekend.
Nasser, having taken over the skipper’s arm band from Charlotte Caslick as part of a post-Olympic reshuffle, also scored a crucial try in the final just before halftime.
But it was the 29-year-old long-time star Caslick herself who made the vital, match-sealing turnover with just 22 seconds left as New Zealand, who scored tries through Jorja Miller, Risi Pouri-Lane, Theresa Setefano and Manaia Nuku in the roller-coaster showdown, pressed desperately for a last-gasp winner.
It helped earn Caslick the player-of-the-final award and left her being mobbed by her adoring teammates afterwards. “I think every year we roll out more and more young girls and it shows the depth of our program,” she said.
In contrast to the success of Tim Walsh’s outfit, Australia’s men, the Olympic semi-finalists, endured a miserable season-opener, eventually finishing seventh overall after going down 22-20 to Argentina in the quarter-final, when even a terrific hat-trick from Henry Paterson proved not quite enough.
The Australians then won their consolation match 17-12 against Britain, featuring another Paterson try, to take the seventh spot as Fiji went on to take the crown, defeating first-time finalists Spain 19-5.
© AAP
