The IRB has announced the pools and schedule of matches for the seventh and penultimate round of the HSBC Sevens World Series, the Emirates Airline London Sevens to be staged at Twickenham Stadium on 21-22 May. 

Tournament hosts England, who won the Dubai Rugby Sevens earlier in the season, currently lie second in the World Series standings and head Pool B with matches against Argentina, USA and France on day one. 

England are 13 points behind leaders New Zealand, who head Pool A as top seeds having won four of the six rounds played so far. The eight-time World Series winners face opening ties against Wales, Kenya and regional qualifiers Spain. 

Reigning World Series champions Samoa are third seeds and face three tough matches against Canada, Scotland and defending London champions Australia. 

South Africa are the only other side to have won a Cup title this season, at the USA Sevens in Las Vegas, and line up against Fiji and the other two European qualifiers, Russia and Portugal. 

"A home tournament is a major advantage - the travel that you don't have to do and also the knowledge that you're in front of your own Twickenham crowd is going to make a big difference to us," said England Sevens coach, Ben Ryan. 

"We've set ourselves a target of winning our home tournament all year. We need to take that out and we'll look at where we are in relation to everyone else after London. We still want to make sure that we've got a chance to win the Series. It's going to take a big effort, but stranger things happen in Sevens. We hope that we can win the next two tournaments." 

"Once again the stage is set for a thrilling climax to the season," added IRB Sevens Manager, Beth Coalter. "Last year the crowd, the weather and the rugby combined to make Twickenham an electric and truly memorable weekend of Sevens and we can all expect more of the same this year." 

Article courtesy of irb.com.