Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile has warned against complacency in the Rugby World Cup in France in September after South Africa’s success in the Super 14 competition.
Speaking in the National Assembly on Wednesday, he joined Freedom Front Plus leader Pieter Mulder in congratulating the Sharks and Bulls in qualifying for the Super 14 final.
”These boys and their coaches have obviously done very well in reaching this level of the competition,” Stofile said. ”But I want to warn South Africa that we must not be complacent; while we were focusing on preparing for the Super 14 competition, the other countries were preparing their teams for the World Cup in France in September.
”To start that process now is going to take more than parliamentary speeches, more than recalling old and retired players who may have been very good in this local competition,” he said.
What will be needed are broad-minded and creative selectors and leeway for the leadership of rugby to lead in the process of preparing players for the World Cup.
”Parliamentarians will do well not to march up and down in the streets and stadiums of South Africa because they want to interfere with that process. They will do well not to raise their concerns to the detriment of these elected leaders who are doing their work properly.
”Those who give our players a reason to show grit on the playing field, rather than shouting in Parliament, are those who will help South Africa play well in France,” Stofile said.
Earlier, Mulder said the achievement in the Super 14 and the victory over the Australian and New Zealand rugby teams strongly indicates that South Africa has a very good chance to win the World Cup, as in 1995.
Trophy on tour
Meanwhile, the official World Cup trophy stimulated nostalgia in South Africa where it arrived on Wednesday for a two-day visit ahead of the tournament in France later this year.
The Webb Ellis Cup arrived in the country as part of a French international rugby-development plan that will see young rugby players from around the world travel to France to play French school teams and watch World Cup games.
The organisation Jeune Planete Rugby has chosen two youths — Lee-Wright Banda and Shane Gilbert — from Soweto and Johannesburg to go to France as part of the Rendezvous 2007 exchange programme.
The trophy is in the country for the first time since South Africa won the tournament against New Zealand in 1995, and will be on display at the French embassy in the capital.
”We thought that getting the Webb Ellis Cup in advance of the World Cup to South Africa would energise the South African squad,” quipped French ambassador Dennis Pietton, who welcomed the gilt silver and gold trophy along with members of the 1995 South African World Cup-winning players and officials.
”[Though] we don’t want to energise them too much to the point where they would be unbeatable. That is why we are having the trophy only for two days,” added Pietton.
Springbok team manager Zola Yeye said the return of the trophy brought back the euphoric memories of the day when former president Nelson Mandela handed over the cup to winning captain Francois Pienaar at the packed Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg.
”It brings back the euphoria and elation in 1995 when we won this cup. It being here today stimulates the anxiety to lift it again in France in a few weeks,” he said.
The trophy is named after a student of the England Rugby School who is thought to have invented rugby by showing his lack of football playing skills in 1823 when he picked up a soccer ball and ran with it.
Though this version has been disputed by historians, the cup was commissioned by the International Rugby Board for the inaugural World Cup 20 years ago in 1987. New Zealand, South Africa and England have each won the four-yearly tournament once and Australia have won it twice. — Sapa-AFP, Sapa