Now the denizens of the Antipodes know what it is like for South Africans every year. Every year, we begin the Super 14 (or 12, and before that 10) with high hopes and every year it takes about six weeks for those hopes to be utterly dashed. On the occasions when one of our teams sneaks into fourth position it is forced to travel across the Indian Ocean towards inevitable defeat.
By the time the final comes around we have all lost interest, especially as 9am (in New Zealand) and 11am (in Australia) are starting times that do not coincide neatly with flipping a chop and opening a can of beer. Besides, who really cares if a team from Canterbury can beat a team from Canberra?
Not this week, though. This week we shall celebrate the hegemony of South African rugby, heedless of the antecedents that suggest a successful Super 14 is the harbinger of a poor international season and heedless of the notion that with great power comes great responsibility.
To hell with the rest of the world: this is our time.
And if such chauvinism is a little outré 13 years into democracy, then let us thank the politicians (white then, black now) who help remind us why sport matters. It’s because without the mindless pursuit of a variety of funny shaped balls we might actually be forced to take seriously the mindless utterings of elected officials.
When rugby went professional at the end of the 1995 World Cup, a new competition was simultaneously created. The Super 10 ended in May 1995, with the Queensland Reds beating a Transvaal side led by Francois Pienaar at Ellis Park 30-16. The Super 12 began on March 1 1996. In the first game, Auckland beat Wellington 36-28 in Palmerston North.
From that day to now, the final has never been played in this country, despite the fact that all three Super 10 finals were held either in Johannesburg or Durban. As for the idea that one South African side might play another to decide the champion team, perish the thought. The most surprised tourist of the week will be Steve Walsh, the New Zealand referee appointed to blow at King’s Park.
But it is clear to even the most jaundiced eye that the best two teams have reached the final. The Sharks lost just once at home and triumphed three times on tour.
They were unbeaten for the first six weeks of the competition and had the strength of mind to come back stronger after mid-term defeats in Australia and New Zealand.
The initial success at home was not without its tribulations. The Sharks should have lost to the Crusaders in Durban. But Odwa Ndungane finished off a move created by Adi Jacobs, scoring a try some three minutes after the final hooter had sounded.
Ruan Pienaar’s conversion from the touchline gave the Sharks a one point victory margin and reversed the log point allocation, with the Crusaders getting one instead of four. The significance of that kick to the Sharks’ fortunes has been mentioned, but it was equally crucial for the Bulls, for without it the Crusaders would have clinched a home semifinal, there would have been no 92-3 thrashing of the Reds at Loftus, and the whole complexion of the season might have been changed.
The Bulls began their season rather like a riderless horse. They lost 17-3 to the Sharks at King’s Park and looked hopelessly short of the hot contenders pre-season hype had made them out to be. JP Pietersen scored the first couple of his 11 log section tries and the old criticism of the Bulls passed from person to person: damn fine if Plan A works, but if their forwards don’t win the tight exchanges there is no Plan B.
It is fair to say that the Bulls never actually looked like semifinal material until they went on tour. In Australia and New Zealand, where you could count previous Bulls victories on the fingers of one hand, they suddenly found themselves. As it turned out, the Waratahs had an awful season, but we weren’t to know that when the Bulls put them to the sword in Sydney.
Heyneke Meyer’s team did enough on tour to give themselves a chance upon return to fortress Loftus, and they grasped their opportunity with both hands. The defeat of the Blues on a passion-filled Friday night in Pretoria was the highlight, and Sharks coach Dick Muir has probably hidden the video of that game on top of the cupboard with the other X-rated movies.
For the Sharks to win this week they will have to find an extra gear. They have been successful without ever destroying a team in 2007. By contrast, the Bulls have discovered that they are a far better team than they ever gave themselves credit for. In the normal scheme of things, they should win. But this is the Super 14 final and normal doesn’t apply.
The football fan’s guide to rugby
Scrum: Eight players from each team bound together in three rows for each team, closing up with their opponents to form a tunnel. Each team faces their opponents’ goal line. The ball is thrown into this tunnel by the scrumhalf and the opposing sides try to hook the ball with their feet to the rear of the scrum so that the scrumhalf can pick it up again and put it into play.
Lineout: Two lines of equal numbers of players standing in a straight line at right angles to the line of touch. The lineout begins when the player throws in the ball. The players attempt to knock the ball to the receiver and play resumes.
Ruck: A type of play where players from each team close around the ball on the ground, using their feet to win or keep possession of the ball.
Maul: When a minimum of two players (one from each team) close around the ball carrier. This group of at least three ”with the ball being carried and not on the ground” then move towards the goal line.
Offside: In general play a player is offside if in front of a teammate who is carrying the ball, or in front of a teammate who last played the ball. A player who is offside is not allowed to be part of the game until he has become onside again.
The object of the game: To carry the ball over the opposition’s try line. — Extracts from The Little Book of Rugby by Niki Moore