England won a superb final in sudden death extra time against New Zealand 31-26 to claim the London Sevens rugby tournament at Twickenham.
The win is England is first on home soil in five years and means South Africa will have to wait another week before celebrating winning the World Series.
South Africa leads England by 20 points in the race for the overall title after yesterday’s result.
New Zealand was quickly into their stride in the final and scored three unanswered tries with Julian Savea touching down twice and Kurt Baker adding the other.
England needed to score first after the break and did so through powerful wing Uche Oduoza. Ben Gollings converted to make the score 19-7 and Micky Young’s score brought it to 19-12.
England capitalized on a period of sustained pressure to pull level with James Rodwell breaking through the defense to score under the posts, but Zar Lawrence capped a superb personal performance to pull New Zealand ahead again, 26-19. With the seconds counting down New Zealand seemed to have the final under control but
Gollings converted to pull England level, take his own sevens tally to 2000 points and the match into extra time.
With the 36,000 strong crowds on the edge of their seats, England pressed into New Zealand territory and when the forwards won a scrum against the head, halfback Micky Young sprinted to the corner to clinch victory.
New Zealand, the defending series champions, has a final chance to nail their first tournament win of the series in Scotland next weekend.
South Africa now has 116 points, ahead of England, 96, Fiji, 82, New Zealand, 80, Argentina, 68 and Kenya, 60. Earlier, New Zealand beat South Africa 10-5 in the Cup semis to postpone any World Series celebrations for the South Africans.
Solomon King and Kurt Baker scored New Zealand’s tries to Gio Aplon’s effort.
England overcame Scotland 26-12 to reach the final.
In the Plate competition, Fiji beat France and then blitzed Portugal with a superb first half performance to notch a 24-10 win.
