Dubai: UAE rugby coach Roelof Kotze is remaining positive despite his side’s second consecutive Asian Five Nations demotion after a 30-13 defeat at home to Singapore in a play-off for Division One survival at the Sevens Stadium on Wednesday.
First half-tries from Jono Bester and Neil Pommerel put the UAE 10-7 in front after half an hour. But Singapore, who opened with a try and conversion from Edward Carne and Suhaimi Amran, returned with a hat-trick from Luke McCabe and a further conversion and penalty from Amran before Stuart Lakin’s late kick sealed the win.
Asian Five Nations sides usually get four games to decide their fate in an annual two-month round-robin, but this year — due to the restructuring of all six divisions in time for 2015 — relegation and promotion came down to a one-off, do-or-die decider.
These conditions were testing for the home side as it was Kotze’s first competitive game in charge of the UAE since taking over from outgoing Epeli Lagiloa in February. However, the South African was undeterred.
“It’s a downer to lose and get relegated but one has to look at the positives,” he said. “We have to build a winning culture. It will be easier in Division Two to compete and win more than we lose, and the quicker we get into a habit of winning, the sooner we can turn it around.
“We were in the lead in the first half and we are not used to being there too often. We just have to learn how to win and close games out. That will take time, and playing matches against teams of our own peerage will help.”
Restructuring process
The UAE staved off relegation from the Top Five for three consecutive seasons before last year’s demotion to Division One. At present, there are five teams in each division, but the restructuring process will see the top three remain and the bottom two drop down. It is unclear where this new format will leave the UAE, but Kotze remains positive about the future.
“The fact we were still in the game in the first half shows our systems are working,” he said. “We have the basics of what we want to achieve we just need more time together. A few youngsters are coming through, which bodes well for the future, and there are those who just missed out on the squad that could help us push forward.
“You need time together to cement the concepts you want to apply. It was a competitive game but Singapore got a couple of lucky breaks on the bounce. As soon as we lost the lead, we started to chase and the pressure became too much. We lost structure and that’s where things go from bad to worse.”
