Shujaa bows out of Toulouse Sevens

Kenya Sevens' Edmund Anya in action at the Singapore Sevens last month. [World Rugby]

Kenya Sevens were on Friday bundled out of the Toulouse Sevens Main Cup after losing their opening two Group A matches to New Zealand and Uruguay respectively.

The defeats leaves Shujaa chances of surviving relegation from the World Ruby Sevens Series even slimmer.

Kenya got off to a poor start after going down 19-5 to Uruguay in the afternoon kick off at the Stade Ernest-Wallon Stadium in France.

Baltazar Amaya gave Uruguay the lead inside the opening second minute with a corner post try for a 5-0 lead.

Mateo Vinals stretched the scores to 10-0 before Guillermo Lijtenstein's conversion saw the South Americans lead 12-0 at the break.

In the final half, poor ball handling and easy penalties give away by Kenya saw the patient Uruguayans capitalize to stretch the lead to 19-0 through Bautista Basso and Lijtenstein's conversion.

George Ooro Angeyo scored Shujaa's consolation try at the last minute after an offload from Brian Tanga to lose 19-5.

In their second match, Shujaa went down 31-5 to series leaders New Zealand.

Che Clarke, Regan Ware, Roderick Solo and Moses Leo touch down the All Blacks tries as Dennis Abukuse scored Kenya's consolation try.

The result left them bottom of the group before their last match against Canada on Saturday.

New Zealand lead the standings with six points followed by Canada with four points same as Uruguay. Kenya has two points.

Currently, Kenya are 13th in the standings with 37 points, 12 points behind Uruguay heading into the final two legs in Toulouse and London.

Following this weekend's penultimate event in Toulouse, the 15th ranked core team will be relegated while the 12th through 14th ranked teams will face-off next weekend in London against the Challenger Series 2023 winners - Tonga - for the 12th and final position on the 2024 Series.

The relegation play-off will be a round-robin format with the top two teams then playing a final.

The winner will become the 12th core team on the 2024 Series, while the other three teams will enter their respective Regional Sevens Championships in order to qualify for the 2024 World Rugby Sevens Challenger Series.

As it stands, Japan (16 points) hold the lowest ranking among core teams but the race to avoid the relegation play-off took another twist with Uruguay (49 points) returning to 11th after their run to the Cup quarter-finals in Singapore. Uruguay, Spain (48), Kenya (37), Canada (24) and Japan will all be fervently trying to accumulate points in Toulouse.

Japan could escape automatic relegation if they make the Cup quarter-finals and Canada finish last or second-to-last this weekend.

Uruguay will avoid the relegation play-off if they finish higher or equal with Spain in Toulouse, while Spain will leapfrog Uruguay if they finish one position higher than Uruguay.