Tonga overcomes France in their last match of Rugby World Cup 2011
Tonga secured the most astonishing victory of the ongoing Rugby World Cup while beting France by 19-14 on October 1 in Wellington. Kurt Morath helped his side with 14 individual points to overcome the European giants.
Tonga made four changes to their side to play the last match of Rugby World Cup 2011. Their skipper, Finau Maka, made a comeback into the side after missing the last clash. Viliame Iongi replaced Fetu'u Vainikolo and Andrew Ma'ilei was preferred over Alipate
Fatafehi at the inside centres’ postion.
Meanwhile, French coach Marc Lievremont also featured four changes in his team that played against the All Blacks during their previous outing of the world showpiece. Morgan Parra was given the role of fly-half, Maxime Médard of full-backs’ and Alexis Palisson
was handed over the first big opportunity of playing in the global event. Furthermore, William Servat was elevated to the hookers’ position in place of Dimitri Szarzewski.
The French side started off the match as favourites and straight away took a lead over Tonga just in the second minute of the match with the help of Dimitri Yachvili, who scored a penalty goal for his side. The score was equalised by Tongan player, Kurt
Morath, in the same fashion in the sixth minute.
France could score just one more three pointer before the break whereas Tonga increased their total to 13-6. Saku Hufanga, who was served a yellow card just before the interval, scored the only try in the 26th minute of the match.
France needed a fiery start in the second-half to curtail the Tongan lead as soon as possible and Yachvili provided them the perfect oppurtunity. He scored an early penalty goal after the break and gave his side hope to make a comeback in the match. However,
they slumped further and scored just one try in the last minute of the match when it was too late.
Morath displayed a Man of the Match performance to secure an upset victory over France. He scored 14 individual points for Tonga to conclude their RWC journey in an exceptional way. France still made it into the quarter-finals after they got a losing bonus
point from the match.
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