Powell to be ‘virtual’ coach in Blitzboks’ quest for Games gold

Tokyo — The SA Sevens rugby side have turned to video conferencing in their bid to win a gold medal at the Olympic Games in Tokyo as Neil Powell takes on the role of virtual coach to lead the squad from his isolation room in Kagoshima.

Team SA have been hit by four infections, one in the Sevens rugby side and three within the soccer team competing at the Games.

Sevens head coach Powell has tested positive for Covid-19 and must isolate for 14 days, meaning he will not be on the sidelines when one of the pre-tournament favourites go for gold from July 26-28.

But he will continue to help the side he has coached since 2013 in their preparations this week, albeit through a computer screen, and will liaise with assistant coach Renfred Dazel on match-day.

“We came to Japan well-prepared, with the hard work done at home, so this is just a small distraction in that bigger picture,” Dazel said in a media release from SA Rugby.

“It is going well, the players adapted well to the situation, so credit to them.”

The entire squad was placed in quarantine on arrival in Japan when they were identified as close contacts of an infected person on their flight from Doha to Tokyo. The group, bar Powell, have since been cleared.

That delayed the team's arrival at their base camp in Kagoshima from Wednesday to Saturday as they isolated in Tokyo, meaning they have missed vital training days.

“We obviously need time out on the field from a physical point of view, so we hope to stretch the legs a bit,” Dazel said.

“We are all still in good spirits and understand that we can't change those things we can’t control. We did manage to add fun elements into the adjusted training schedule and that certainly helped.”

SA won a bronze medal under Powell at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and they will be among the favourites again. They are in Group C with the US, Kenya and Ireland.

Reuters