The Australian women's sevens team has finished with the silver medal at the Pacific Games after falling 12-10 in Friday night's final to Fiji in Papua New Guinea.
In difficult conditions at the Sir John Guise Stadium, Georgie Friedrichs opened the scoring for the inexperienced Aussie outfit after a tight start with several handling errors committed by both sides.
However, the Fijians turned the game around by levelling up just before the break before taking advantage of a Friedrichs yellow card to move 12-5 ahead with 75 seconds left on the clock.
A previously disjointed game came to life in the final minute when a patient period of play in midfield between Laura Waldie and Dom Du Toit set Nicole Beck clear to score.
Unfortunately the Australians missed the vitalconversion to the right.
Coach Tim Walsh was disappointed with the result.
"For me the game was there to be won and I'm pretty disappointed that we couldn't get the gold," Walsh said.
"Defensively we were fantastic, we covered the inside shoulders but in attack we just couldn't quite execute while our re-starts weren't on the mark.
"Eight of the team were on their national team debut and perhaps at times showed their inexperience - to play against a side that has a wealth of World Series experience behind them was always going to be a tough ask."
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