{"id":77533,"date":"2016-06-19T07:52:13","date_gmt":"2016-06-19T11:52:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=77533"},"modified":"2016-06-19T07:52:13","modified_gmt":"2016-06-19T11:52:13","slug":"canadian-heartbreak-olympic-qualifier-narrow-loss-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2016\/06\/19\/canadian-heartbreak-olympic-qualifier-narrow-loss-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadian heartbreak at Olympic qualifier after narrow loss to Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Canada's<\/a>
Canada’s Olympic men’s rugby team loses to Russia. (Photo: Rugby Canada<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MONACO\u2014Canada’s Olympic men’s rugby sevens dream was extinguished Sunday in a 14-12 loss to Russia in the quarter-finals of a last-ditch qualifying tournament.<\/p>\n

Only one country advances to Rio from the 16-country repechage event at Louis Stade II.<\/p>\n

Trailing 14-7 late in the game, Canada had a chance to tie when Ciaran Hearn crashed over the line on the right flank leaving a tough conversion. Nathan Hirayama, one of the leading point-scorers on the World Series circuit, missed the kick and Russia coralled the ensuing kickoff, booting the ball into touch when the clock ran down to end the game.<\/p>\n

The first half was a cagey affair with Russia taking a 7-0 lead with no time remaining on a converted try by German Davydov. Conor Trainor answered for Canada early in the second half with Hirayama’s conversion knotting the score at 7-7.<\/p>\n

Captain Vladimir Ostroushko broke through a pair of tackles for a converted try that gave the Russians a 14-7 lead with under three minutes to play.<\/p>\n

Spain defeated Ireland 12-7 in the first quarter-final.<\/p>\n

The Canadians made things difficult for themselves Saturday by losing 21-19 to Germany in their final game on Day 1 after crushing Uruguay 33-0 and Sri Lanka 57-0.<\/p>\n

The loss meant the Canadians finished runner-up in Group B to unbeaten Germany and had to play Group C winner Russia rather than runner-up Chile.<\/p>\n

Canada, Russia and Samoa are the only three teams in the 16th-country qualifying field that competed on the HSBC World Series this season. Samoa, which won the Paris Sevens, finished ninth overall while Canada was 13th and Russia 14th.<\/p>\n

Canada and Russia split their six meetings on the World Series this season with the Russians winning the last two\u201419-14 in Hong Kong and 33-0 in Paris.<\/p>\n

Canada had to go the repechage route after losing 21-5 to the U.S. last June in the NACRA Sevens Cup final and finishing ninth overall in the 2014-15 World Series. The top four on the circuit that season qualified automatically for Rio.<\/p>\n

Ireland, which upset Samoa, joined Germany as a surprise team on Day 1 in Monaco. Both sides went unbeaten along with Russia and Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

The qualifying tournament winner will join host Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Britain, Fiji, France, Japan, Kenya, New Zealand, South Africa, and the U.S. at Rio 2016.<\/p>\n

The Canadian women have already qualified for the Olympics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MONACO\u2014Canada’s Olympic men’s rugby sevens dream was extinguished Sunday in a 14-12 loss to Russia in the quarter-finals of a …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":77536,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,44],"tags":[398,11303,9855,9798,512],"class_list":["post-77533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-sports","tag-canada","tag-mens-team","tag-rio-olympics","tag-rugby","tag-russia","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}