Williams will captain a relatively inexperienced Australian team at their home event, to be held at Spotless Stadium for the first time.

Williams and Wagga’s Alicia Quirk will be the team’s two most capped players at the tournament, which starts on Friday.

Williams said the opportunity to play in front of an Australian crowd is something very special.

“Playing on home soil is absolutely amazing, we don’t get to do it very often, that’s why it’s so important to us to get people out here to watch the action live,” Williams said.

“We travel the world and play at really odd hours of the day and people have to set their alarms to get up and watch so why not get out here and watch it live and start this 2019 off on a really good, high note by winning it.”

While the Aussies will not go in at full-strength, Williams has full faith in the young women that have been included in the squad.

“It’s really important to grow the growth of rugby and these girls have really stepped up,” she said.

“You saw them play in Dubai, that try that Lily (Dick) scored towards the back end of the game, she’d played the whole 14 minutes and to come out and score a try like that is definitely something that she had been working on and something that we were all very proud of, to see some young girl step up like that at that crucial moment.

“They’ve definitely got it in them, they’ve got the belief and got the trust of the team and Johnny (Manenti) as well and that’s really important in the youngsters.”

New Zealand will enter the tournament as the $1.50 favourite to take the title. The Kiwis defeated Australia in the final of the Commonwealth Games last year but Williams is not concerned about revenge.

“I don’t really look at it as revenge but it’s also about taking those opportunities,” she said.

“Some of those girls actually weren’t in the team so it’s new opportunities for these girls. There’s so much talk about the gold medal and things like that but this is a completely different team, different team to Comm Games as well, it’s about building that team and helping them succeed and make them aware of what a successful team is.”

Rather than looking back on previous results, or the players that are not available, Williams said the Australian team is looking at the positives.

“It can change your mindset if you want it to but it also can be the highs, you look at the highs of this – home tournament, you’ve got your friends and family watching, new location, so it’s a little bit different,” she said.

“Just being acclimatised to this weather as well, there’s so many positives for us to take forward, we don’t need to look back, we need to look forward and live in the now and go forward as a team.”

Australia kick off their campaign with a pool game against Spain on Friday afternoon, followed by games against China and USA.

The quarter finals will take place on Saturday, before the semi-finals and final on Sunday.

Australian women’s team at Sydney Sevens

Friday

1.50pm: Australia v Spain

4.34pm: Australia v China

6.56pm: Australia v USA

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