Los Angeles Sevens: Carlin Isles and Perry Baker hit 200 tries but Australia spoil USA party with victory in pool C

American speed kings Carlin Isles and Perry Baker blazed their way to 200 tries each in the HSBC World Sevens Series on home soil, but the defending champions were undone in the pool stage by an Australian side boasting a player looking to usurp them as the fastest sevens player on the planet.

Isles and Perry scored a try each as the USA defeated Scotland 33-12 and Samoa 19-17 in their opening pool C matches in Los Angeles.

However, in their final group match, the home side – who won the past two USA Sevens in Las Vegas – were brushed aside 17-7 by Australia, who were thrashed by the US in front of their own fans at the Sydney Sevens. Australia finished top of the table with three victories after earlier beating Samoa 31-5 and Scotland 31-7.

The Aussies feature former sprinter Trae Williams, who has run the 100 metres in 10.4 seconds and has switched to rugby sevens in the hope of making his country’s squad for the Tokyo Olympics.

Although Williams – seen as a speed rival to Isles and Baker – failed to score against the USA, he touched down against the Scots and Samoa to mark himself as one of Australia’s danger men.

“We got our pants pulled down by the States on our home turf and that hurts a fair bit,” said Australia’s Nick Malouf. “Massive motivation for us to come out here and reciprocate what they did to us.

“We’ve had a huge focus on our ruck and our physicality over the last couple of weeks so really nice to see that pay some dividends today.

“I know what it’s like for my family and my fiancée to watch us get smoked, and yeah, it hurts so we just wanted to come out and put in a really good, clinical performance in all three games today and I think we did that.”

Australia take on Ireland in the quarter-finals while the Americans face South Africa, who are second in the series after four tournaments, having won the opener in Dubai and reaching the finals in Cape Town and Sydney.

The Blitzboks topped pool B, beating Kenya 31-5, Canada 33-5 and salvaging a 19-19 draw with Ireland, while series favourites Fiji and leaders New Zealand also won three games each.

Fiji beat South Korea 45-7 before beating France (33-28) and Argentina (38-14) in pool A. New Zealand, who won in Cape Town and Hamilton, finished top of pool D with victories over Wales (42-7), Spain (21-7) and England (21-17).

Fiji go on to face England in Monday’s (Hong Kong time) quarter-finals while the All Blacks Sevens play France.

The Los Angeles Sevens is the fifth leg of the 10-stop men’s World Series, with the teams travelling to Vancouver afterwards for leg six.

The Hong Kong and Singapore Sevens were supposed to be held over the first two weeks of April but those tournaments were postponed until October because of the coronavirus epidemic.

London and Paris are the final two World Series events before the Olympics.