{"id":721951,"date":"2026-06-07T23:47:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T23:47:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/721951\/"},"modified":"2026-06-07T23:47:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T23:47:16","slug":"rugby-news-world-sevens-series-2025-26-maddison-levi-stars-as-australia-beat-new-zealand-in-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/721951\/","title":{"rendered":"Rugby news, World Sevens Series 2025-26: Maddison Levi stars as Australia beat New Zealand in final"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maddison Levi<\/a> produced another heroic performance as Australia<\/a> overcame New Zealand to be crowned champions of the 2025-26 World Sevens Series<\/a> in France on Monday (AEST).<\/p>\n

Returning from a knee injury on the final day of the season, the superstar bagged two tries and saved one with an incredible defensive play as Australia defeated the Kiwis 26-19 in Bordeaux.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Australia celebrate winning the 2025-26 World Sevens Series.\u00a0Alex Ho\/World Rugby<\/p>\n

The victory marks a return to the pinnacle of world rugby for Australia\u2019s women, who were previously crowned champions of the 2023-24 season.<\/p>\n

When the full-time whistle sounded, Aussie players streamed in from all directions to pile on top of each other, overflowing with jubilation. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s pretty surreal,\u201d Levi said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the girls playing the first four games of the tournament leading up to the final was just a momentum builder.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey helped me get back and I wouldn\u2019t be here without them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Levi starred in both defence and attack when the game was on the line in the final three minutes.<\/p>\n

First, the 24-year-old brought down Katelyn Vahaakolo with a brilliant chase-down tackle, denying the Kiwis as the Aussies clung to a 19-12 lead. She also forced a turnover.<\/p>\n

Then, in the phase that followed, the ball was spread out to Levi on the left edge inside the Aussies\u2019 half of the field, and she palmed off Kelsey Teneti with a powerful right-arm fend-off and accelerated away to seal victory.<\/p>\n

Levi, unsurprisingly, was named player of the match.<\/p>\n

The other Aussie try-scorers were rising star Heidi Dennis and Olympian Faith Nathan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have an amazing squad at home and the depth of our program is unbelievable,\u201d said Aussie co-captain Isabella Nasser.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe saved the best until last in regards to our performance and to be able to perform at the crunch time in the World Championship is really important to us.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just really proud of the girls and how they showed up.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was fitting the Aussies and Kiwis squared off in the final \u2013 they had faced each other in every decider of the season, which kicked off in Dubai last November.<\/p>\n

\u201cChampions are not stars,\u201d said Australia\u2019s coach, Tim Walsh.<\/p>\n

\u201cChampions are team players that consistently show up and perform even when they don\u2019t feel like it.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing in Bordeaux we themed this tournament as the 2026 vintage. We visited a vineyard for our jersey presentation and wanted the 2026 vintage to be remembered, and we\u2019ve done that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three Aussies named in \u2018dream teams\u2019<\/p>\n

Three Aussies earned selection in the 2025-26 World Sevens Series \u201cdream teams\u201d named at the completion of the championship in Levi, Nasser and Henry Hutchison.<\/p>\n

Hutchison was named in a dream team for the first time, Nasser for the second consecutive season and Levi for the third year in a row.<\/p>\n

Levi also finished as top-scorer of the women\u2019s series, having chalked up 64 five-pointers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maddison Levi produced another heroic performance as Australia overcame New Zealand to be crowned champions of the 2025-26…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":721952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-721951","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\/721951","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=721951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/721952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=721951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=721951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=721951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}