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Fijian columnist calls for McKee sacking as backlash begins
By Ian Cameron
Reporting from Tokyo: A Fijian journalist has called for head coach John McKee to be sacked following his side's shock loss to Uruguay at the Rugby World Cup.
Fiji’s 30-27 defeat to Uruguay at the Kamaishi Recovery Memorial Stadium on Wednesday now sees the Pacific Island nation needing a miracle to qualify for the quarter-finals of the competition.
The Flying Fijians were pre-tournament favourites to cause a World Cup upset, but it has been McKee's charges who have fallen foul of a lower-ranked team.
The result has been met with anger back in Fiji. Fiji Sun journalist Leone Cabenatabua has gone as far as calling for headc coach McKee to be sacked.
"Fiji Airways Flying Fijians head coach John McKee must go. There are no two ways about it. Last night's embarrassing 30-27 loss to Uruguay in the Rugby World Cup pool clash at Kamaishi, Japan, was the last straw.
"Especially, when this was the same Uruguay side we thrashed 68-7 in London, last November.
"If we're serious with our rugby then the Fiji Rugby Union must act now even before the World Cup is over.
"We had expected a much better performance from the Flying Fijians taking into consideration that this is McKee's second World Cup with them."
Fiji scored four tries and lost by less than eight points, therefore earning two bonus points. Under the current rules theirs is only the fifth such performance in RWC history.
McKee himself refused to blame the team's abject goalkicking for the loss. "Obviously, in hindsight, we could say that we could have done things differently.
"Yes, today our goal-kicking was a factor in the game. We only kicked one goal, and with such a narrow margin in the score-line, the goal-kicking would have made a difference. However, there was a lot of other things we could have done well in the game, so you can’t narrow it down to one thing."
"It is going to be challenging for us. We are relying a lot on other points now and, for us, we just have to focus on our match against Georgia in eight days’ time. That is the only focus for us now, to play well in that match and winning the game, and, if we can, securing the bonus point."
Press conference with England winger Joe Cokanasiga and coach Steve Borthwick ahead of the side's Rugby World Cup match against the USA.
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Latest Comments
Yeah well you guys couldn't do it at home could you, never mind in Italia. Theyve been good for a few years now, 23' when France and Ireland were at their best were arguably better Italian performances than this years 6N results.
My point was of course they don't want to get ahead of themselves and then lose against teams that they should be beating. That's the difficulty with getting better and better.
Go to commentsThey’re being dressed as midfielders. Neither of them is a natural midfielder, they’re both converts.
You can call a rose by any other name, yada yada, as Billy Shakespeare says. Semantics.
New Zealand went all the way from having a surplus of midfielders in about 2015 to having to convert wingers and two different utility backs (Havili, Jordie). How did that happen?
All the while actual specialist 12s and 13s are not even getting a proper shot. Laumape lost patience with that nonsense. Big Leicester as well (now that’s a winger convert that would actually make sense at 13). It’s literally stupid not to try players out.
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