Fiji eventually overcame a belligerent Scotland performance in Newcastle on Saturday to book themselves a spot in the Rugby League World Cup quarter-finals.
The Fiji Bati outlasted the Bravehearts 30-14 at Kingston Park, meaning only a miraculous Italy win over Australia by between 70 and 80 points in Saturday’s final Group B game could deny the South Pacific islanders a place in the last eight.
Henry Raiwalui was the star of the show, scoring one and creating another in a first-half performance which set the stall out. Scotland, though, kept dragging themselves back into it and leave the tournament with a much-improved effort under their belts following two disappointing results against Italy and Australia.
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Taniela Sadrugu crashed over between the sticks on a short ball to open the scoring for Fiji, with Brandon Wakeham kicking the extras. Raiwalui put on a real skills show for their second, with a wonderful show-and-go then a scintillating reverse-pass which saw Viliame Kikau cross for their second try of the encounter as the Bravehearts suddenly started to get flashbacks to their 84-0 loss to Australia last time out.
But Lachlan Walmsley picked off a loose pass from Raiwalui to race 90 metres to the line as Scotland finally got a foothold in the game with only their second try of the tournament.
The Fiji half-back made amends for his error by extending his side’s lead five minutes before the interval. Wakeham’s high kick was not dealt with by Walmsley, and Raiwalui was on hand to mop up and touch down.
Scotland ensured that the game wasn’t about to run away with them though, as Ben Hellewell was on hand to finish from James Bell’s inch-perfect kick on the stroke of half-time. Walmsley missed the kick, but at 18-8 the Scots were still right in the contest.
Yet they once again made things difficult for themselves as Luke Bain was sent to the sin-bin soon after the restart for a high shot on Sunia Turuva, leaving them under the pump for 10 minutes at a crucial stage of proceedings.
And the inevitable happened when Raiwalui and Kikau combined on the left to send in Maika Sivo and Fiji again had a three-score lead. Bayley Liu hit back when he finished off a left-to-right move having initially made the break from deep to set up the attack, with Kyle Schneider converting to reduce the deficit back to 10.
In an increasingly tempestuous second half, Walmsley was then sat down for 10 minutes for his high tackle on Turuva having previously found himself in the middle of a number of spats. Fiji’s Kikau went with him for running in to the resulting melee.
But the short numbers favoured Fiji, with Korbin Sims planting the ball down to finally put Scotland out of reach at 30-14 with barely 10 minutes remaining.
Barring the biggest upset in sporting history when Australia meet Italy in St Helens on Saturday night, Fiji will face New Zealand in Hull next Saturday in the quarter-final match-up
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