August 18, 2021 – Rugby Americas North (RAN) is happy to announce that the Federación Mexicana de Rugby (FMRU) is set to host the 2022 RAN Super Sevens from February 11th to 13th in Mexico City.
The three-day tournament – which features Senior and Age-grade divisions for Men and Women – will act as a qualifying tournament for the Centro Caribe Games in 2022, RWC Sevens qualifiers in June 2022 (location TBC) and the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England in 2022.
While it has yet to be confirmed how many teams from RAN will qualify to compete in the Centro Caribe Sevens, the top seven Men’s and Women’s teams from the tournament in Mexico City in February, providing they are Full Members of World Rugby, will move forward to the RAN RWC Sevens qualifier. They will join Canada in two eight-team qualification tournaments. The highest-placed Men’s team eligible to participate in the Commonwealth Games will represent RAN, alongside Canada who have already pre-qualified for Birmingham.
Click here to view RAN’s up-to-date three-year calendar for 2021 – 2023.
Mexico is a familiar location for many athletes throughout the region, having played host to numerous RAN Sevens, U19s and Women’s 10s tournaments, including the 2014 CASCO Games Sevens (now renamed Centro Caribe) in Veracruz, as well as international 15 a-side fixtures.
Held over three days and open to all RAN Members, the tournament will bring together the best Men’s, Women’s, and Under-18 athletes in the region.
The event is the third officially planned competition in RAN’s calendar since returning from COVID-19, with the 2021 RAN Men’s Sevens set to take place in Turks and Caicos in October 2021 and the RAN Beach 5s kicking off 2022 in Hollywood Beach, Florida on January 8th. Additional events will be announced in the following weeks.
The entire tournament will be streamed live on RAN’s website, with highlights, scores, interviews, and other content provided on its social media pages.
RAN General Manager, Niall Brooks:
“We are delighted to be bringing RAN’s Senior and Age-Grade Men’s and Women’s Super Sevens competition to Mexico City to kick start what should be a very busy and exciting year for Rugby Sevens globally and throughout our region.
“In additional to the Senior Men’s and Women’s competition, RAN is also excited to host its inaugural age-grade sevens tournaments to underpin and support the continued growth and development of up-and-coming youth players of our Member Unions.
“Rugby Sevens enjoyed another successful Summer Olympic Games at Tokyo 2020, and tournaments like this age-grade sevens event will help our members develop talented and skilled athletes who hopefully will go on to represent their country at Senior International level and perhaps at future Olympic Games.
“With countries in our region at various stages of their COVID-19 vaccinations and recovery, we will be following strict protocols set forth by World Rugby, RAN and the Mexican government in the lead up to and during the tournament. This is especially important, when we have a relatively large number of players, management, and spectators, all coming together in one place.”
Ernesto Sainz Carrillo – FMRU Chairman:
“As members of the FMRU, we are extremely thankful to RAN for giving us the opportunity to host the Senior and Age-grade Men’s and Women’s Super Sevens in February 2022.
“We look forward to being an extraordinary host and organising a tournament that will allow all of our rugby friends to come together in Mexico City, after a tumultuous two years and demonstrating that we are ready, strong and together.
“Our rugby community is eager to warmly receive our rugby guests and hold a high-quality competition amongst national teams from throughout the region
“We are certain that this tournament will re-ignite and trigger our efforts in growing and developing a larger and better prepared community of girls and boys, youth and senior players, coaches, referees, medics, and managers.
“Our federal and local authorities are supporting our efforts and looking on with interest and seeing for themselves the rugby atmosphere which will be on show, which hopefully will be so different and so appealing to a new and large segment of the population. Let´s bring fun, great competition, and a bright return to rugby.”