The Fiji Airways Flying Fijians defeated Samoa 24-22 in its opening match in the Pacific Nations Cup at Suva’s ANZ Stadium.

Kini Murimurivalu, Ben Volavola and Henry Seniloli scored the tries in the first half as Fiji led 17-3.

Vereniki Goneva scored the only try for the Flying Fijians in the second spell.

Fiji’s Jale Vatubua, skipper Akapusi Qera and debutant Eroni Mawi were sin binned in the game.

Melani Matavao, Jack Lam and Dwayne Polataivaia scored the tries for Samoa in the game.

Flying Fijians Coach, John McKee says it was really disapointing to see his side received three yellow cards.

Given three cards in the match was too much. That’s one area we will look at when we get back to camp and also we made some errors in the game. We will go back and look at our game and try and rectify our mistakes."

Samoa Coach Titimaea Tafua says they made a lot of mistakes in the game.

We made silly mistakes. We really have to look in to that and try and avoid that from happening. We started slow in the first half and we picked up the momentum in the second half but it was too late to match up the Fijian side score margin."

Meanwhile, in another match ealier, Georgia edged Tonga 16-15.

Fiji plays its next match against Georgia whereas Samoa meets Tonga next Saturday at Suva’s ANZ stadium.