Portia Woodman-Wickliffe had already cemented her legendary status in rugby before making more history against Japan. So much has been said about the winger, with the former Black Fern Kendra Cocksedge saying she \u201cisn\u2019t human\u201d and the New\u00a0Zealand star Ruby Tui describing her as \u201cout of this world\u201d. And on Sunday Woodman-Wickliffe became New\u00a0Zealand\u2019s all-time record try\u2011scorer as the side secured their quarter-final place with a big win.<\/p>\n
Woodman-Wickliffe moved one ahead of Doug Howlett, who scored 49 tries in 62 Tests, while the Black Ferns wing reached her 50 tries in 30 Tests. She also added to her record number of World Cup tries which now\u00a0stands at 22.<\/p>\n
Asked if there are any more records for her to break, the 34-year-old Woodman-Wickliffe replied: \u201cPlenty. I don\u2019t know what they are but it is a testament to the team. I had to tell my mum \u2018don\u2019t talk about it\u2019, there is so much external pressure about it. I thought: \u2018I am going to score this one and get it done and out of the way and then I don\u2019t have to think about it for the rest of the game.\u2019 Ultimately it is the team, my job is to finish what the team creates. If I can do that and it adds to the records so be it but in my mind that has nothing to do with what I do. I just go out there and do\u00a0my job.\u201d<\/p>\n
Braxton Sorensen-McGee also laid down a marker, the full-back scoring an impressive hat-trick and kicking four conversions, while the back-row Jorja Miller ran in two tries.<\/p>\n
Silence descended over Sandy Park for the Haka but there was a rumbling of \u201cooo\u201d as Japan formed an arrow and moved forward into a line to lay their own challenge down to New\u00a0Zealand. The Black Ferns \u00adlegend Tui was sat just in front of the press box and she stood and followed along with the Haka too, rippling the atmosphere into the stands.<\/p>\n
Less than a minute into the game the Japan full-back Sora Nishimura was injured after colliding with one of her teammates and it \u00adinvigorated the team. They scored one of the best team tries of the tournament so far with the wing Sakurako \u00adHatada finishing well. But you blink and New\u00a0Zealand can turn a game around, and they did just that with Woodman-Wickliffe\u2019s try.<\/p>\n
The score was a pretty special piece of individual skill but Miller\u2019s score next somehow eclipsed it, she ran a lovely line and evaded two \u00addefenders. \u00adKatelyn Vahaakolo, Sorensen-McGee, \u00adKennedy Tukuafu all scored before Haruka Hirotsu received a yellow card which was sent for a bunker review for a high tackle but it remained a sin\u2011bin\u00a0only.<\/p>\n
Braxton Sorensen-McGee scored a hat-trick of tries in New Zealand\u2019s emphatic win. Photograph: Tom Jenkins\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
The second half began with a New\u00a0Zealand yellow card for the replacement back\u2011row Laura Bayfield for a deliberate knock\u2011on. Japan then scored a try as Moe Tsukui went over but it wasn\u2019t long until the Black Ferns added to their points with Sorensen\u2011McGee in for her second.<\/p>\n
skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week’s action reviewed<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Bayfield was shown a second yellow and so was given a red card for collapsing a maul resulting in a Japan penalty try. New Zealand responded perfectly with a great try by Miller, Sorensen-McGee was in again and Renee Holmes also scored.<\/p>\n It was a huge win for New \u00adZealand but the Japan head coach, Lesley McKenzie, provided important context saying there are fewer than 400\u00a0women playing rugby in the country. Japan are also a \u00adnon-professional side; New\u00a0Zealand have 45 full-time deals.<\/p>\n Japan will play Spain in their final pool match, while New Zealand and Ireland will battle it out for the top of the pool next Sunday. One thing that is certain is Woodman-Wickliffe will continue to mark herself out as one of, if not, the game\u2019s best.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Portia Woodman-Wickliffe had already cemented her legendary status in rugby before making more history against Japan. So much…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-109094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}