Black Ferns Sevens target Spain redemption after Madrid 2024 semi-final heartbreak

The Black Ferns Sevens travel to Valladolid, Spain, for the second and penultimate leg of the SVNS World Championship having won 26 consecutive matches and five tournaments in a row, yet the wound from Madrid 2024 remains fresh. In that one-off World Championship semi-final, New Zealand surrendered a 19-7 lead in the final minute, with Australia’s Maddison Levi scoring the decisive try after an extraordinary sequence of offloads, and Tia Hinds converting to seal a 21-19 win. Australia went on to be crowned champions.

“We’ve watched that a hundred times,” Black Ferns Sevens talisman Stacey Waaka said. “We mucked up the kick-off badly, weren’t composed under pressure, missed tackles, and panicked.”

Waaka, a two-time Olympic gold medallist and scorer of 138 tries, said the squad’s response has been characteristically direct. “The cool thing about this group is that we hold ourselves accountable to the highest standards. We’re honest with each other, always looking for that extra edge. So yes, our last trip to Spain — which I love by the way, the food, the culture, the people — was not good, and we want to put that right.”

The broader context underlines just how dominant New Zealand have been. Since 2000, the Black Ferns Sevens have won 62 of 94 tournaments and 533 of 585 matches across all competitions. In the SVNS era from 2012, they have won 48 of 60 Cup final appearances, with 27 of those victories coming in 37 matches against Australia specifically — the same opponent who ended their Madrid campaign.

The squad’s resilience was on display as recently as March in New York, where they rallied from 21-5 down with only 3:42 remaining to win. That kind of composure is precisely what Waaka says was missing in the Spanish capital two years ago.

Waaka, known in commentary circles as “The Smiling Assassin” — a nickname coined by commentator Rikki Swannell in 2019 — insists the label captures something genuine about her approach to the game. “I have the best bloody job in the world, so I should do it with a smile. It doesn’t have to be serious all the time. I want to play with joy in my heart while at the same time knowing that there is a job to do.”

New Zealand had won the four SVNS events immediately preceding Madrid 2024 — in Vancouver, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, and Singapore — and have won 10 of the last 11 SVNS Cup finals they have contested, all against Australia. Valladolid offers the clearest possible opportunity to add another chapter to that record, on the same soil where it was briefly interrupted.