The Australian Steelers have moved on to the quarter-finals of the World Wheelchair Rugby Championship.
The Aussies are already assured of advancing to the knockout stage after thumping Colombia 54-42 on Thursday, following other commanding victories over Brazil, Canada, and Denmark this week.
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This set up a battle with Japan to decide the top of group B, with the defending world champions coming away with the 54-50 victory.
“Mentally, this was the toughest match of the preliminaries. Being able to face the fourth team of the other pool will give us some ease physically as we move up in the competition, so we will need to make the most of that in terms of results,” Japan captain Yukinobu Ike said via WRWC.
“I think it is a wonderful thing that we advanced to the knockout stage by winning all five of our games.”
Despite this, Steelers star Andrew Edmondson said the performance showed the Australians were building nicely for the matches ahead.
They are out to prove a point to rivals after their nine-year reign as Paralympic champions ended when they missed out on a medal in Tokyo last year after falling to the hosts 60-52 in the bronze medal match.
"We worked on a lot of things in that game. Thankfully we got a good lead and got the opportunity to give some of our guys a rest, so bring on the next game," Edmondson said.
"We're just getting started. We're doing well but I think maybe some teams have forgotten about how good we can be.
"We definitely haven't, that's why we're here and we really building something."
Australia will face Great Britain in the quarter-finals, who entered as the team to beat after taking gold at the 2020 Paralympics.
