Pirates underlined why they have been touted as one of the teams to beat in this season's New England women's 7s competition with a clean sweep against the reigning champions in their season opener.
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The newcomers were impressive in accounting for The Barbets 26-14 and 22-5, their fluency even surprising coach Anthony Barbara given they have a lot of new faces and hadn't played a game together before Saturday.
"I thought it would take a bit more time for them to get to know each other but everything sort of fell into place," Barbara said.
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But as promising as the performance was they aren't getting too far ahead of themselves. It is only early and there are "a lot of good teams out there".
"It was just good for our girls to feel each other out and get to know each other because they haven't seen each other play rugby. They've trained a lot together," Barbara said.
"It was still rusty in patches but that will come with time."
Even over the two games on Saturday he said you could see the girls that hadn't played a lot of sevens start to pick up what the game is about.
"You could see them slowly getting to understand what we're trying to teach with sevens," he said.
"It's not all about contact, it's more about moving the ball and trying to work to space."
Super W rep Claudia Nielsen scored a double in both games and "was very good" in what what was her first real game of competitive sevens.
"She's pretty athletic and fit and sevens is probably a game that's going to suit her," he said.
Having played most of her rugby in the 15-man game, she is still adjusting to the vagaries of sevens but is "super inquisitive" and "wants to learn".
Shae Partridge also looks like being a handy acquisition.
The speedster is one of two Walcha locals lacing up the boots (Chloe Swanton is also going to play but was unavailable on Saturday) and showed what she can do with a brilliant solo effort in the second game.
"For her first game of rugby she showed a lot of promise," Barbara said.
"She scored a 90m try in the second game and she's got a fair few wheels."
Erika Maslen was another who was really good for them.
"She can read a game very well and has got a great pass," he said.
