Former Australian Rugby Sevens captain Charlotte Caslick says fixturing decisions for the HSBC Rugby Sevens tournament in Perth are ‘empowering,’ with the women set to close out the weekend’s action.

Traditionally, the women’s finals has been fixtured as a curtain raiser for the men’s final at the SVNS Perth tournament, but the organisers announced last week it would be the other way around. 

For the first time in World Series History, the Women’s gold medal match will be played after the men, a move that defies the norms in sport and recognises the strength and popularity of the Women’s Rugby Sevens in Australia.  

The weekend’s action takes place at HBF Park, with the pool stage on Friday January 24th, the remainder of the pool matches and finals the following day, while the medal matches take place on Sunday January 26th.

Australia has only won their home tournament once – in 2018, with Caslick hoping they can do it this time and appear in that final.

“We’re really excited to hopefully be playing in that game,” she told SportFM.

“If not, for whoever is, I think it’s just really empowering for women and throughout my whole career, HSBC and the Sevens series has always led from the front in that space. 

“I think as a woman in sport at the moment, rugby is just in such a great place and you can see that they continue to lead from the front at every single area. 

“The girls are really excited to hopefully be closing out the tournament and being able to take out our home tournament as well.”

Perth is the third stop of seven locations in the World Rugby Sevens tournaments, having played in Dubai and Cape Town before heading to Australia. 

Australia took the lead into South Africa after winning the opening leg in Dubai, but will be looking to regain it after finishing fourth during the second leg in Cape Town. 

Only their Trans-Tasman rivals New Zealand sit ahead of them with a four point margin after a strong start to the tournament, with podium finishes in both cities. 

While the Kiwis are a team to look out for, Caslick says her side isn’t underestimating any match up. 

“New Zealand are definitely always strong. They won the last tournament in Cape Town,” she said. 

“We have France in our pool, which will probably be our toughest pool game. They’re a great side, so that will probably be the big one for us at the start of the tournament.

“Then looking into the finals, we’ll probably cross Canada or USA, obviously New Zealand. We can’t try and take one game at a time, but there’s a fair few teams at the top that give us a good challenge.”  

The Women’s Rugby Sevens team have been trailblazers in the space of Australian women’s sport, especially after their landmark gold medal during the sport’s maiden outing at the 2016 Rio Olympics. 

From there, only more success has followed them, including gold and silver medals in the 2022 and 2018 Commonwealth Games, and nine top three appearances in the World Sevens Series – four of which were wins. 

This has inspired many people to follow and pick up Rugby themselves, especially women – something Caslick is proud of. 

“Especially in the women’s side of the game, Rugby Sevens has been a huge area of growth,” she said.

“I know that since the Rio Olympics in 2016, the amount of women participating in Rugby Sevens just has continued to grow and grow.” 

“We’re really proud to be at the forefront of that and encouraging more young, not just girls, but boys to play our sport. 

“I think because it’s a little bit more simple in terms of the laws that we play in Sevens, they’re the same, but obviously there’s only three people in the scrums, the lineups and things like that. 

“It’s a great sport for young kids in the community to pick up and get like an introduction before they might transition to the 15-a-side format.“

IMAGE: World Rugby