Men’s and women’s sides are in Poland for the second - and final - leg of the Championship sevens circuit for 2022
The action in the Rugby Europe Championship sevens first leg in Lisbon last weekend was fast and furious - and now we have three days of more of the same to look forward to in Krakow, Poland between Friday and Sunday.
Germany won the men’s and Poland the women’s event in Portugal, but there are plenty of sides on both of their tails who are looking to earn gold over the next few days and also perhaps win the overall titles.
This is also the last chance for many of the squads to fine tune things before the European Rugby World Cup sevens qualifier in Bucharest, Romania, in mid-July.
And for the likes of Scotland’s women it is their last chance to impress before the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England, towards the end of July.
So, plenty at stake then and, in the men’s event, Germany have been drawn in Pool A with Belgium, France, Czechia and Georgia.
Belgium finished fourth last week and will be a danger, but the Germans may face their toughest test from France who will have been frustrated to only end up fifth last time out.
Spain were runners-up last week and they are in Pool B this time around with Italy, Portugal, Lithuania and Poland.
Italy were third last week and will be out to top the pool, but Spain will hope that Eduardo Lopez continues his great try scoring form from Lisbon to help them go one better this time around and upgrade silver to bronze.
Poland were 10th in leg one and will be hoping a home crowd can spur them on to greater things.
The men’s event gets underway at 2.28pm local time (12.28pm UTC) on Friday when Germany takes on Georgia.
Poland’s women are assured a big cheer when they play on home turf after winning dramatically in the dying seconds of the Lisbon final versus Scotland.
The Polish team are in Pool A this time around along with Ireland, Czechia, Germany and Romania.
Ireland will be ones to watch as they will have been frustrated to only finish fourth in Portugal.
Scotland are in Pool B alongside France, Spain, Belgium and Wales.
France finished third last week and will be looking to build on that showing while Scotland and Spain drew 14-14 in a pool clash a few days ago, so that rematch could be tasty.
Poland versus Romania gets things underway in the women’s competition at 1pm local time (11am UTC) on Friday.
Last week the winners of the pools in both the men’s and the women’s competitions went straight into the final, but this time there will be semi-finals too just to crank up the tension even more to decide who will be 7s European Champions 2022.
All matches will be live in rugbyeurope.tv and FloSports in North America.
