Australia's defence of the women's world rugby sevens series title took a big hit when they finished third at the tournament in Japan on Sunday.
Australia won four straight games in Kitakyushu before being hammered 33-0 by Canada in the semi-finals and miss the chance to vie for their first event win of the season.
And it took a Chloe Dalton try with 30 seconds remaining in the bronze playoff match to sneak home over Fiji 19-17 to claim third.
The last-minute victory meant Australia (66) retained second place in the series standings after four of six rounds, but slipped 10 points behind leaders New Zealand after the Black Ferns won the final.
The Kiwis grabbed their third tournament triumph when they scored a try after the siren to snatch a 17-14 win over Canada.
Australia will likely need to win the last two tournaments in Canada and France and hope New Zealand finish fourth or worse to win back-to-back world titles.
After breezing through their first three games on Saturday to top their pool, Australia accounted for France 19-12 in the quarter-finals but suffered a double injury blow with Ellia Green and Evania Pelite joining Emilee Cherry on the sidelines.
But Canada came in off a 41-0 mauling of Russia and backed that up with a comprehensive five-try victory over the Rio Olympics gold medallists.
"Our younger players really stood up but they still have a long way to go," coach Tim Walsh said.
"On day two though the reality is that we weren't good enough, especially against Canada."
Earlier, Cherry celebrated her 100th world series try in the quarter-final victory, becoming only the second player to reach the milestone after New Zealand's Portia Woodman.
"It was nice to kind of get the monkey off the back and get that 100 finally," Cherry said.
"It wasn't the greatest performance by us, we kind of slacked off in the last three to four minutes."
