Volume 20, Number 606 March 2020

 

“New Zealand have been dumped out of the semifinals at the Los Angeles Sevens after a precision display of knockout footy from South Africa.” - Stuff magazine, New Zealand.

 

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Blitzboks Bounce Back With a Vengeance

After two disappointing legs of the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series in Australasia a few weeks back back, Neil Powell’s men arrived in Los Angeles last week with a point to prove. And prove it they did.

Thrice, against Ireland in the pools, USA in the quarters and in the final against Fiji, they clawed their way back into the game and the tournament. It was a fantastic performance.

Blitzboks opened their account in LA with a solid victory over Kenya (31-5). It was sweet revenge for the shoe being on the other foot in Hamilton the last time the two sides met. They followed this with an assured 33-5 defeat of Canada.

But, as suggested above, the wheels almost came off in the third and final pool game against Ireland. Blitzboks fell behind twice and fought back to level the scores – the second time was after the hooter. It was tight and if the Irish had held on to the ball for a few more seconds before kicking it out, they could have won.

 

But the draw secured top spot in the pool and set up a quarter-final against the host nation, USA. The home team put Blitzboks on the back foot early with two tries from speedster Carlin Isles, giving the hosts a 10-0 lead. But South Africa reduced the score to 10-5 at half-time courtesy of a try from Ryan Oosthuizen.

Blitzboks piled on the pressure in the second stanza, and despite some resolute American defence, finally broke through when JC Pretorius barged over under the posts just before full-time. Final score 12-10.

Next up it was New Zealand in the semi-finals and we must hand over to Stuff magazine in New Zealand to describe that for you: “New Zealand have been dumped out of the semifinals at the Los Angeles Sevens after a precision display of knockout footy from South Africa.”

Yup. The final score, in case you missed it, was 17-0, which set up the final against Fiji. And what a final. Blitzboks scored twice in the last minute to first force extra time and then claim a sudden death try winner to beat Fiji (29-24) for the title, and, in so doing, closing to within four log points of series leaders New Zealand.

LA was the seventh tournament of the 2020 series with only three rounds left before attention turns to the Olympics in Japan – Coronavirus permitting. This weekend it’s Vancouver (see our preview on page two).

KEY TOPICS IN THIS NEWSLETTER

Confident Blitzboks Head to VancouverAnother Miserable Super Rugby WeekendPRO14: Cheetahs, Kings Still Struggling

 

Varsity Cup is Much Better Without NoiseToo Many Stars Are Fleeing Super RugbyIs Doping a Problem in Schoolboy Rugby?

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Confident Blitzboks Head to Vancouver

It’s the eighth tournament in the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series 2019/2020 and it takes place in Vancouver, where Blitzboks are reigning champions, having beaten France in the final last year. Could they sweep up two titles on the trot? Possibly, but it will be tough.

They have been drawn in Pool A alongside Argentina, England and Japan but they face them in a different order: On Saturday night they will play Japan (20:06), then Argentina (23:18) and, early Sunday morning our time, they’ll take on the whingers (02:30).

As we noted on the first page, Blitzboks now lie second on the series log, only four points behind New Zealand and if they can get the American double by winning in Vancouver in the early hours of Monday morning, they could jump to the top of the standings – but only if New Zealand don’t finish second.

As it stands currently, and after seven rounds of the series completed, the kiwis are top of the log on 93 points and Blitzboks are second on 89 points. Next best is last year’s champion team, Fiji, on 72 points. The title race is therefore really between New Zealand and South Africa but with three tournaments to play, Fiji could well get back into the mix.

The islanders did win both London and Paris last year – and those are the two legs to come after this weekend. But if they don’t close the gap on both of the two front runners this weekend, they’ll probably leave themselves with a bit too much to do.

And if both Fiji and New Zealand win their pools in Vancouver, they’ll potentially meet in the semifinal. South Africa, meanwhile, is on the other side of the draw. It’s going to be interesting.

Another Miserable Super Rugby Weekend

Can you believe it? Four South African teams played Super Rugby last weekend and the only one to come away with a win was the one that we strongly believe shouldn’t even be in the competition. Typical. Bloody typical.

But then, it was another weekend of upsets – caused largely by the abysmal standard of refereeing. That’s a subject for another day as we let the evidence pile up like it is doing at the State Capture Commission.

The weekend began with two shocks on Friday: Rebels travelled to Dunedin to face Highlanders and managed to come away with a win (22-28); and Lions visited Parramatta (about half-a-hour out of Sydney) only to be robbed by Waratahs (29-17).

Saturday morning dawned with a return to normality, albeit briefly, as Hurricanes blew away Sunwolves (62-15) in Napier. But then the upsets were back as Sharks inexplicably beat Reds (23-33) in Brisbane.

But perhaps upset wasn’t quite the right word for what happened at Newlands on Saturday afternoon when Blues arrived from Auckland. The home team could simply not get into the game and were absolutely awful – more so than usual according to our highly partisan editor. In the end, the visitors ran out 14-33 victors.

The final match of the weekend was at Loftus in Pretoria where the visiting Jaguares simply out-played their opposition (24-39). The win was helped by a Bulls team still intent on playing a domkrag style of rugby and, if that persists, we have a feeling that it will be a long season for the men from Pretoria.

But there was some good news that might help the Bulls’ cause: World Cup-winning eighthman, Duane Vermeulen, will be rejoining the side in June after his contract with Kubota Spears ends.

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PRO14: Cheetahs, Kings Still Struggling

This past weekend also saw a smattering of PRO14 fixtures but, as usual, we’ll just focus in on the two local teams. The first of them to take the field was Cheetahs, visiting Dragons in Newport (Wales).

The first thing to know about the match was that the conditions were typically atrocious (for this time of year in Wales) and did not favour running rugby. Even so, the visitors struck first inside ten minutes through a Junior Pokomela try.

That was followed several minutes later with a Tian Schoeman penalty kick that stretched the lead to 0-10. It took the Welsh side until the 41st minute to get on the board courtesy of a Sam Davies penalty.

That was followed by a try about fifteen minutes later that levelled the scores at 10-10. But well after the final hooter, Davies broke Cheetahs hearts with another successful penalty kick. Final score 13-10.

On Sunday afternoon, Southern Kings hosted Connacht in Port Elizabeth and were 0-14 down well inside the first ten minutes.

The referee gave the home team a lifeline by reducing the Irish side to 14 men via a red card after 15 minutes. Then minutes later, Connacht were down to 13 as Kyle Godwin served out his yellow card.

Kings took full advantage and levelled the scores at 14-all before Godwin retook the field. But the Irish would not be denied and when all was said and done – including two more yellow cards, one for each team – the final score was 19-29.

It was fighting performance but yet another disappointing loss for the local team.

Varsity Cup is Much Better Without Noise

One of our constant criticisms of FNB Varsity Cup rugby over the years has been the noise in the stadia that made it very difficult to stay focused on the brilliant rugby being played. It got so bad last year that we watched with the sound muted.

Thankfully, we don’t have to do that any longer and we watched the televised match on Monday without having to mute it once during the game. [The qualification is because we did mute it for the beauty queen interviews - Ed]

It was the Bloemfontein derby as University of Free State hosted neighbours Central University of Technology and it was a fantastic game with a tight first half that ended 14-19 in favour of the visitors.

But the territory-based game plan chosen by CUT paid off big time in the second half, beginning with a point of origin try that stretched the lead out by a further nine points. There was no way back for Shimlas and everything they tried in the half just went pear-shaped. Final score: 14-35.

Elsewhere, it was a top-of-the-table clash between Maties and Tuks down in Stellenbosch and although Maties came out on top of a close-fought battle (13-7)Tuks retained their position on top of the log due to Maties having had their bye early in the season.

Meanwhile, in Potchefstroom, NWU was facing UJ and they extended the Johannesburg teams winless streak by triumphing 19-6. And in Cape Town, UCT and Wits played to a 10-all draw, allowing both teams to retain their unbeaten status – for now at least.

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Too Many Stars Are Fleeing Super Rugby

Our interest was piqued last week when we spotted a Tweet by Sport24 chief writer, Rob Houwing, in which he asserted that the Super Rugby tournament is in trouble. But let’s rather let Rob speak for himselfsince he does do it pretty well:

“I was able to pick below TWO full sides of quality players, all under 30, who quit Super Rugby ahead of 2020 season...demonstrating one of the tourney's biggest problems.”

Quite. And it’s not a new phenomenon. The staunch Lions supporters in this newsroom remember all to well the destruction wrought when former coach Johan Ackermann packed for Gloucester and took a lot of our talent with him. But we digress.

Houwing's article looks across the competition and he writes: “Perhaps the best way to illustrate that point is to pick a team...just from players who aren’t yet 30, but who bade farewell to the competition ahead of the 2020 version.” Here’s his team:

15: Melani Nanai (age 26)14: Waisake Naholo (28)13: Jesse Kriel (26)12: Damian de Allende (28)11: Nehe Milner-Skudder (29)10: Handre Pollard (25)9: Yutaka Nagare (27)8: Liam Squire (28)7: Pablo Matera (26)6: Kwagga Smith (26)5: Brodie Retallick (28)4: Eben Etzebeth (28)3: Jeff Toomaga-Allen (29)2: Malcolm Marx (25)1: Santiago Garcia Botta (27)

And Now for Something Completely Different

We picked up the report first on Rugby365.com where Jan de Koning reported on the impact on Super Rugby of Japan cancelling all sporting events for the next two weeks in order to try to prevent (or limit) the spread of the Coronavirus.

As a result, he writes that while Sunwolves fans might feel short-changed, the relocation of two of their team’s games has left us with an unexpected spin-off:

“The Sunwolves versus Brumbies match is now played at the ‘neutral’ venue of Wollongong in Sydney, prior to the Waratahs versus Chiefs match – leaving us with a unique doubleheader.”

Unfortunately, there’s a scheduling cock-up that SANZAAR was unable to resolve with the TV networks. The first match will kick-off at 14.45 (05:45 our time) but the people in the ground will have to wait until 19:15 (10:15 our time) for the second match: Waratahs vs Chiefs.

Presumably, the stadium will play the Crusaders vs Reds match (which happens in between) on the big screen. That will theoretically make it a triple-header but we’ll see if it manages to draw a bigger crowd to Wollongong.

Next week, the scheduling will be better. Sunwolves vs Crusaders will now be played prior to the Reds versus Bulls match in Brisbane. Again, the size of the crowd will be interesting.

“While the Blues versus Lions match is still scheduled for Eden Park next Saturday (March 14), the kick-off time has been changed from 19.05 local time to 16.25 local time (to accommodate the scheduling of the Sunwolves versus Crusaders match).”

It could be a very interesting weekend of Super Rugby, and not necessarily for the usual reasons: the quality of the rugby or the abysmal standard of refereeing. You can find de Koning’s preview of today’s matches here and he’ll probably post his preview of Saturday’s matches sometime later today. And you can see the schedule on page eight.

Is Doping a Problem in Schoolboy Rugby?

There’s a piece running on BBC Sport this week about an alleged epidemic of steroid use in South Africa’s schoolboy rugby. Written by Mike Henson, it tries to create the impression that our schools and coaches are complicit in the promotion of steroid use.

But it all falls apart when you read the detail. The article tries to suggest that the annual Craven Week youth tournament is at the centre of it all but then Henson undermines his own argument by reporting:

“Flick to page 40 of the South African Institute of Drug-Free Sport's (Saids) latest annual report and 'Name redacted (minor)' appears six times in the annual list of doping offenders.

“All were teenage rugby players who tested positive for steroids at the 2018 edition of Craven Week. It was no blip. The event has turned into one of the most reliable hunting grounds for anti-doping officers.

 

“Three players tested positive at the 2017 event, four in 2016, five in 2015 and three in 2014. All for steroids.”

Right. What he doesn’t tell you is that Craven Week typically has 20 teams in action every year. Assuming 23 players per team, that’s 460 players, meaning that it’s a tiny percentage that have been caught doping. The fact is that the players are tested. That’s not the case elsewhere in the world.

Indeed, as Mark O'Beirne responds to the article on Twitter:

“Interesting article, but would be hard to believe that it's only happening in SA. Just it's being caught there and subject to lots of testing. Ireland doesn't test schools rugby. The England figures mentioned in article don't specify age brackets.”

But again, we digress. Henson also tries to besmirch the good names of some Springbok players. His story centres around Salmon van Huyssteen, a teenager who was caught at the 2018 Craven Week and banned for two years, so he features the Bulls under-18 team of that year, which included RG Snyman and Ivan van Zyl.

The whole thing strikes us as a transparent attempt to take the gloss off the comprehensive Springbok win at the 2019 World Cup. So, our response to Mike Henson? 32-12. Suck it up you bloody whinger.

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For Your Weekend Rugby Viewing Pleasure

Wow. We’re still on a high after last weekend’s win by Blitzboks – and hoping for a repeat performance in Vancouver this week. So there’s that, the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series on your box this weekend. And there’s also Super Rugby (see schedule alongside).

Over in Europe, the Six Nations and Rugby Europetournaments are back after a one-week break – both competitions have two rounds left unless we’re very much mistaken. There’s only one PRO14 fixture this weekend: Dragons vs Benetton in Newport, Wales. But there is PRO D2 action in France and some Premiership matches in England.

Further afield, MLR continues around America while Top League is on a break. And on Monday, the FNB Varsity Cupin on with all games kicking off at 7pm. The televised match this week is Maties vs Ikeys from Stellenbosch.

 

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The Rugby Team at Leopard Newsletters.

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