The last time the writing of this last column of the year took place on the final day of the Cape Town Sevens it was 2019, before the pandemic, and the world was a different place. SA was still committed to Super Rugby, and aligned to the southern hemisphere season, which meant that here was where the rugby year ended and the off-season started.
Now the Sevens coincides with the start of the busiest part of the season at franchise level, with this past weekend’s historic first Heineken Champions Cup games to feature SA teams clashing with the annual Cape Town shorter code carnival.
It’s going to be strange watching rugby over the festive season when normally Test cricket takes up the main sporting focus. There are two United Rugby Championship (URC) derbies scheduled for two days before Christmas, and on New Year’s Eve the Bulls are in Durban to play the Sharks while the Stormers host the Lions in Cape Town.
A week after that some of the franchises will be on the road again in the URC before the return Champions Cup fixtures, so it is going to be a decisive stage of the season in all spheres of interest — the SA Shield in the URC, where it is nip and tuck at the moment, the overall URC log itself and in the Champions Cup.
Fortunately, the first round of Champions Cup games delivered on enough fronts to whet appetites for rugby at this unseasonal time of year. The Sharks, with a full-strength team playing for them for the first time, put their recent problems behind them to deliver an impressive performance in dispatching London club Harlequins.
In Pretoria, Bulls director of rugby Jake White would have gained a lot from his brave decision to go with a second-string team against Lyon. He would have looked silly had it not worked out, for it is imperative to win home games in the European competition — and it nearly didn’t work out. Lyon’s spectacular fightback from a 28-0 deficit fell just short and they were pressing for the win at the final whistle.
That his team took a full house of five log points from the fixture means White has good reason to smile as he heads into a tough trio of away fixtures against Exeter Chiefs, the Stormers and the Sharks. Not that his willingness to test his depth or, to put it more accurately, give his fringe players game exposure, was as much of a risk as some made out. He had an experienced spine of players such as Morné Steyn, Bismarck du Plessis and Nizaam Carr mixed in with the youngsters.
It was a game that certainly delivered on the entertainment front. Perhaps the sublime attacking play we saw from both teams was helped by passive defence; but still, it was a good advert for the competition.
The Stormers’ defeat to Clermont in the first competition game played by a SA franchise on French soil sent out a different message. And that message is you simply cannot afford to let the home teams into the game when you are playing in front of French crowds. I covered the first post-isolation Springbok tour of France in 1992, which featured several games in provincial venues, and the memory is of them all being very intimidating places where the local teams are supported by passionate, hostile crowds.
The Stormers’ failure to grab a bonus point, which was what coach John Dobson was hoping for as a minimum requirement, places them under pressure to go for a full house of five when they host London Irish this weekend. And to win the return clash with Clermont in Cape Town in January.
It’s all quite exciting and there’s plenty of reason to feel upbeat about where SA rugby is now in comparison to just 12 months ago. The 2021/2022 season exceeded all expectations if you consider that two local teams contested the inaugural final, with the Stormers completing a proper fairy tale by winning it.
But there is still a blight on rugby as a whole that needs addressing urgently if the sport is not going to start losing eyes, and that is the way it is officiated by the referees and TMO, who are only delivering what is required of them by a law book that frankly remains an ass.
The first Champions Cup game on SA soil was nearly ruined by the red card shown to Sharks prop Ox Nche for what was no more than an accidental clash of heads. Yes, rugby’s rulers need to try to keep the sport as safe as possible, but for goodness sake it is a contact sport.
There will always be risk. If the participants don’t like it, they don’t need to sign up for it. They can sit in the press box like me. It is far safer up here. I also get paid far less than they do.
Happy festive season, everyone.
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