Maurice Longbottom (born 30 January 1995) is an Australian

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

and

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

player who played his first game for the

Australia national rugby sevens team The Australia men's national rugby sevens team participates in international competitions such as the World Rugby Sevens Series and Rugby World Cup Sevens. The current captain of the team is Nick Malouf, and the head coach is John Manenti . ...

at the

2018 Sydney Sevens The 2018 Sydney Sevens was the third tournament within the 2017–18 World Rugby Sevens Series and the fifteenth edition of the Australia Sevens, of which the third to be held in Sydney. It was held over the weekend of 26–28 January 2018 at A ...

tournament of the

World Rugby Sevens Series The World Rugby Men's Sevens Series is an annual series of international rugby sevens tournaments run by World Rugby featuring national sevens teams. Organised for the first time in the 1999–2000 season as the IRB World Sevens Series, the com ...

. Longbottom played some matches for the

South Sydney Rabbitohs The South Sydney Rabbitohs are a professional Australian rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen pla ...

junior squad, but was described as "too small for senior footy". Longbottom's performance in the

Oktoberfest Sevens The Oktoberfest Rugby 7s is a rugby sevens tournament held in Munich, Germany, during the Oktoberfest event. In the first edition in 2017, Australia won the title in the final against Fiji, the Olympic champion from Rio. In 2019, South Africa wo ...

drew the attention of Australia rugby sevens team coach

Andy Friend Andrew Friend (born 24 April 1969) is an Australian rugby union coach and former player. He is currently the head coach of Irish province Connacht. He was previously head coach of the Australia Sevens team, the Brumbies in Super Rugby, English c ...

. Longbottom was a member of the Australian men's rugby seven's squad at the

Tokyo 2020 Olympics The , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July. Tokyo was selected as the host city during the 1 ...

. The team came third in their pool round and then lost to Fiji 19-0 in the quarterfinal. He competed for

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

at the

2022 Rugby World Cup Sevens The 2022 Rugby World Cup Sevens was the eighth edition of the Rugby World Cup Sevens organised by World Rugby. The 2022 tournament, comprising 24 men's and 16 women's teams as previously, was played over three days in one venue in September. It ...

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

Personal life

Longbottom is a

Dharawal The Dharawal people, also spelt Tharawal and other variants, are an Aboriginal Australian people, identified by the Dharawal language. Traditionally, they lived as hunter–fisher–gatherers in family groups or clans with ties of kinship, s ...

. He once expressed that he wants to inspire the next generation of

Indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention *Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band *Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehorse ...

athletes.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Longbottom, Maurice Living people Australian rugby union players Indigenous Australian sportspeople 1995 births Rugby sevens players at the 2020 Summer Olympics Olympic rugby sevens players of Australia Rugby sevens players at the 2022 Commonwealth Games