The National Under-20 Rugby 7's
squad posing for a photo with
national rugby coach Ben Bourne
(R). The squad will be competing
in the ARFU (Asian Rugby
Football Union) Asia Junior 7's
Under-20 Tournament in Johor
this Saturday and Sunday.
Picture: BT/ Syarif Rasani
The Brunei national Under-20 rugby squad will be competing in the ARFU (Asian Rugby Football Union) Asia Junior 7's Under-20 Tournament in Johor this Saturday and Sunday.
The Under-20 team seeded seventh will be heading to Johor for the 10 team tournament today.
Brunei will be playing in Group B with Uzbekistan, China, Laos and last year's runner up Hong Kong.
They will play Hong Kong in their first game on Saturday at 9am.
Their last encounter saw Brunei lose 46-0 in last year's edition of the competition.
Their second match of the day will see them take on Uzbekistan at 2.20pm. Uzbekistan beat Brunei 17-5 last year.
The last match of the day will see the Under-20's take on China at 4pm.
Their final group match will be against Laos at 9am on Sunday.
All of the Under-20's games will be contested at Dataran Bandaraya in Johor Baru.
Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia and defending champions Malaysia make up Group A.
"We all feel a bit nervous about Hong Kong because we know that they finished second last year," said National Under-20 vice captain, Muhammad Azizan Hj Zainal Ariffin.
"We know how good Hong Kong is so we will try out best. We are a lot more confident with the new players this year and we aim to perform better than the last two years," he said.
"We will definitely be putting more fight into it. I think we have a chance against China because they are new to this tournament, so I'm hoping we can win or draw against them," he added.
"I'm also hoping that we can put up a good performance against Uzbekistan and I'm very confident we can challenge Laos because Brunei's level of rugby isn't that different from theirs."
The Under-20 team lost 17-0 to Chinese Taipei and 26-5 to Thailand in their Group-B round last year.
Brunei then contended in the final bowl against Philippines, which they lost 31-0.
