A unique shot at history awaits the Aussie Men's side as they prepare to return to Hong Kong.
The effects of COVID saw the historic event postponed from 2019-21, leaving event organisers scrambling to fast-track its return.
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This resulted in dual stops on the 2022-23 World Series calendar, with the Australians capturing their first title at the home of Sevens in 34 years at the Series opener in November.
With the Women set to join them for the first time as it returns to its usual early-April timeslot, Manenti was weighing up how to approach the historic challenge.
“I keep chopping and changing how I want to sell it to them,” Manenti admits.
“It would be remarkable to go back-to-back, we’d be the first team ever to win Hong Kong two times in a season because it’s never been done before and maybe done again. A real big incentive last time was it hadn’t been since 1988 that we’d won as well so it’s a different kind of challenge
“The big picture that is overriding it all is a good performance puts us in really good stead for the back three tournaments for (Olympic) qualification but there’s no question Hong Kong is the jewel of the Sevens World Series crown and the feeling I’m getting talking to people is it’ll be back to its absolute peak.
“We had a really good tournament there last time. I don’t want to still sit here and spruik the ‘back to back’ to the boys. If we look after the consistency, we’ll give ourselves the chance to play at the pointy end of the tournament."
Consistency remains a major issue for Manenti with their hopes of Olympic qualification in their own hands.
They sit in fifth, which currently counts as an automatic spot at next year's Games with hosts France in third.
Two points separate the French and Aussies, whilst South Africa and Samoa remain ready to pounce five points back from Manenti's side in sixth/seventh.
Manenti admits they have ridden their luck over the past two tournaments, needing results to go their way to make the knockout stages after early group stage struggles.
It heightens the importance of each event as the circuit continues to grow in competitiveness, highlighted by Uruguay's shock defeat of Fiji in Vancouver.
“I don't think we’ve played our best footy. We’ve probably had a bit of luck but I do feel like we’re building momentum," Manenti believes.
“We’re still struggling for consistency and that’s my biggest focus. We played some excellent football (in LA and Vancouver) and we played some really poor football. We got a bit lucky that some results went our way and gave us the opportunity.
“What we did do with significant personnel out is we started to get that belief that we can compete with anyone on the circuit. We’ve beaten Fiji, NZ who were the untouchables for a couple of tournaments so that gives you plenty of belief.
“We’ve had some decent results along the way but our bottom end is letting us down. There’s a real focus to turn up to training and not have one good day, one bad…we know if we can be consistently in that good stuff, we’ll give ourselves a great chance of staying in the mix with qualification.
“Going into Hong Kong, we have that confidence and belief in the group and we should be really excited to go there.”
