UAE-raised duo eye 'dream' return to Dubai Sevens in women's world series with Belgium

A pair of former Dubai schoolgirls hope to book a return to the city later this year as players on the sevens world series after their Belgium side reached the qualification decider.

Femke Soens and Louka Blommaert grew up playing rugby on the fields of the UAE. Now they are housemates in Brussels and teammates in the Belgian national sevens team.

At the weekend they helped their side secure a place in the top four of the Sevens Challenger Series, after finishing third at a tournament in Krakow.

It meant Belgium qualified for the final event of the HSBC SVNS campaign, which is how the competition previously known as the Sevens World Series was rebranded this season.

Belgium will now enter an eight-team competition at the season-ending tournament in Madrid at the start of next month.

That will give them a shot at playing in the top-tier series next season – and so a place in the Dubai Sevens in November.

“That would be insane and a dream come true,” Blommaert, who lived in Dubai from when she was six months old, said of the prospect of returning as a world series player.

“Every time the Sevens was on, we would watch the world series matches and say, ‘Imagine if this was us one day.’ If we were to do that next year, it would be crazy.”

Both players already know what it is like to play on Pitch 1 at a packed-out Sevens.

Blommaert was given special dispensation by Belgium to play for Dubai Hurricanes, her childhood club, last year while she was recuperating from injury.

It meant she was able to play in the same side as her mother, Elke Vinck, who is a former international judoka turned rugby player, in a Hurricanes side who reached the final.

“I asked if I could play with my mum, which I had been planning to do for some