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After pulling off a surprising win against Ireland, Rugby World Cup 2019 hosts Japan faced Samoa in a Pool A clash on 5th October at the City of Toyota Stadium. Japan went into the game in second place in the Pool with 9 points while Samoa were in fourth. A win against Samoa would be enough to seal a spot for Japan in the quarter-finals.
Japan can finish on top of the Pool if they win their next match against Scotland on 9th October. Failing to do so would mean they will finish second. While on the other hand, Scotland have to win the game to stand a chance of remaining in the tournament.
In the first half, the difference was not much as Japan scored 16 points while Samoa scored only nine. In the second half of the game, Japan left Samoa way behind as they scored 22 points to Samoa's ten.
Final Score: Japan 38-19 Samoa
Highlights:
- The first points of the game came as a result of a penalty kick from Japan's Tamura, taken from the central position.
- Tamura pocketed another three points with a fantastic kick as a penalty was called against Samoa.
- Samoa got off the mark as Henry Taefu kicked the ball straight into the posts through the middle to score a three-pointer at a penalty against Japan.
- Another penalty against Japan was given and Samoa made no mistake. Henry Taefu brought Samoa's score equal to Japan's with a beautiful kick from inside the 22.
- A third penalty was called against Samoa and Japan's fly-half Tamura scored a three-pointer for the third time in the match.
- TJ Ioane from Samoa tried to wrap his arms around the opponent and was shown a yellow card. Samoa went down to 14 men for the next ten minutes.
- Attacking gameplay from Japan brought about another try, this time under the courtesy of Lafaele, followed by a fantastic conversion from Tamura.
- One more penalty was called against Japan. Taefu from Samoa made no mistake and reduced the difference by 3 points.
- After half-time, the scorecard read Japan 16-9 Samoa.
- Taefu brought his team back into the game with a beautiful kick to start the second half as a penalty was called against Japan.
- The match had lot of penalties as one more was added against Samoa and Tamura converted it into three points.
- Samoa's defense was not that great as Himeno added a try to his side by diving over the try line before Tamura again added two more points.
- Taefu was able to score one more try after diving over on the right-hand side of the pitch and adding two more points himself keeping Samoa close to Japan.
- Japan was one try away from getting a bonus point as Fukuoka scored a try from the corner after the initiation of Lemeki. This raised their lead to 12 points but this time there was no conversion.
- Japan finally managed to retain a bonus point in the added time to the match under the courtesy of Matsushima and the same man Tamura was there to convert the try to add two more points.
Japan cemented their place in the quarter-finals and moved to the top of the Pool with Ireland in second after defeating Samoa with a massive lead of 19 points.
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