Sean Horan learning Sevens from the best in the World Album
Sean Horan,the New Zealand Women's Sevens Coach has spent the past 3 weeks learning the Sevens game from the best in the world. He travelled to Australia and then the United Kingdom with Gordon Tietjens, the undisputed best Sevens coach in the world, Tony Philp the New Zealand Rugby Union’s High Performance Manager and the New Zealand Men’s Sevens rugby team.
In Australia he watched the New Zealand Men’s Sevens team play Australia (who had won the previous IRB Sevens Tournament in Japan) play the curtain raiser to the Crusaders v Waratahs Super 15 match in Sydney. Also being played at this time was New Zealand v the World Champions Australia Touch Test Series which undoubtedly he would have watched as several of the New Zealand Women’s Touch players are also leading Sevens players (with 3 of them going to Rome Sevens in May with Aotearoa Women’s Seven’s team).
Sean has been able to watch the New Zealand Men’s Sevens team train for 3 weeks, win the Scotland Seven’s Tournament and then in London win the IRB World Seven’s series for the 10th time in 13 years.
Also at the London Sevens tournament was all the top Women’s Sevens countries in the world (except New Zealand) playing in the IRB Women’s Sevens Tournament. This included England, who won the event, Australia, France, USA, Canada and Netherlands.
To be able to observe Gordon Tietjens coach for 3 weeks and the best exponents of Men’s and Women’s Sevens game in the world, play in leading tournaments would have been invaluable for Sean Horan ,who admits he is still learning the Sevens game.
Over the next 3 months he and Tietjens, who both live in Tauranga will be able to fully plot the plans and evaluate the players who have been through the Talent in Development Camps over past 12 weeks to ensure the New Zealand Women’s Sevens team which will be selected from a training squad of 30 players ,will be the best available .Then he has 4 months to develop them into a team capable of beating the best in the world at the IRB Dubai Sevens in early December and then going on and winning the Sevens World Cup in Russia in June 2013.
