Lilly-Rose Bennett of Narooma has scored an amazing 11 tries during the gold-medal winning campaign by the Australian women's Rugby 7s team at the Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas.
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She scored a hat-trick of tries in the final match against Canada on Friday, sealing the gold medal for Australia and impressing everyone in the rugby world.
Mother Simone Maybury can’t wait to see her champion daughter, who was about to board her flight back to Australia with the rest of the team.
“She’s had a blast,” mum said. “She’s been very excited and has done so well and has enjoyed being part of a team of a great group of girls.”
The Year 11 student at Narooma High School turns 17 next month and will now consider her options, including attending a specialist sport school in Canberra.
Asked about the possibility of being in the next Australian women’s sevens team for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, mum said it was definitely on Lilly-Rose’s radar.
“That’s what she’s aiming at, for sure,” she said.
Lilly-Rose has been committed to the sport from a young age, playing with the boys in the Under 8s through to the Under 12s, when she made the switch to league tag with the Narooma Devils. She went back to union playing for the ACT Brumbies juniors, and was playing both league and union for a time.
Emulating their success of the 2015 Games, the Australian women's rugby sevens team won gold after a thrilling 31-5 victory over Canada on Friday morning.
The Aussies went through the tournament undefeated, beating Bermuda, Trinidad and Tobago, Fiji and Wales before their encounter with Canada in the decider.
In the gold medal match, the Aussie girls started strong with Lilly-Rose opening up the scoring for her first of three tries before Canada hit back for five points.
Rose-Bennett's second try came early in the second half, scooting over the line to keep Australia in the lead but it was her third that demonstrated her smart footwork, roaming off the wing to crash over the line.
It is second successive Commonwealth Youth Games gold for women’s Rugby 7s, following success in Samoa 2015, again against Canada.
According to the Commonwealth Games Australia website, the Australians burst out of the blocks via a try from Lilly-Rose, but the Canadian team answered soon after.
In a tight first half, Lilly-Rose crossed again for her second try, while a try saving tackle at the other end from Rebecca Goulding helped Australia to 12-5 halftime lead.
In the second half, it was all Australia. Lilly-Rose completed her hat trick of tries, while teammate Page McGregor added another to put the game out of the reach of the Canadians.
