/ 15 August 2013

Roving rugby: So far, so 
good, Soweto

Bryan Habana.
Bryan Habana.

Both teams will be wearing jerseys that include a picture of Nelson Mandela on the sleeve. They will be sharing the venue with Bafana Bafana and a multiracial crowd of more than 80 000 people is expected.

Step back from the present and count the non sequiturs in that paragraph. Mandela emerged from 27 years of imprisonment in 1990. History (and Hollywood) chooses to remember the former president’s role in inspiring the Springboks to World Cup victory in 1995. 

But it generally chooses to ignore the time, three years later, when the South African Rugby Football Union (Sarfu) dragged Mandela to court.

His crime was to set up a commission of inquiry into allegations of deep-seated racism in rugby. Sarfu president Louis Luyt argued that the body was privately constituted and therefore immune from government inquiry. Mandela came to court to argue that rugby’s role in nation-building trumped that fact.

Fifteen years ago the idea of the Springboks participating in a Nelson Mandela Sport and Culture Day would have seemed inconceivable, but it is happening. Moreover, it is happening in Soweto, and it is remarkable to think how quickly we have become blasé about such an unlikely venue hosting games of rugby.

It only came about when Fifa locked down Ellis Park and Loftus Versfeld for the 2010 World Cup, forcing the South African Rugby Union (Saru) to think outside the box to determine a venue. Having broken the ice, Saru now schedules a game annually in Orlando, and this year it added another soccer venue to the roster — the Mbombela Stadium in Mpumalanga.

The visitors are also shaking off a troubled past. Argentina are playing in a proper rugby competition outside of the World Cup for only the second time in their history. What’s more, the Pumas’ best players have been made available by their European clubs and they even got to play a warm-up game against the Waratahs in Florida last week. 

It would have seemed impossible just five years ago, when the fat cats of Sanzar decided to play each other three times a year rather than allow the South American interlopers space at the top table.

It is important to remember all the positives, because a few negatives were slipped in by Saru this week. Firstly, Saru allowed Paul Treu to leave their employ after 10 years. Treu coached the Blitzbokke, as the Springbok Sevens team is known, in 83 tournaments during his decade in charge. Before taking the coaching reins, he played for the side in 24 tournaments, scoring 70 tries along the way.

A press release attempted to paper over the cracks, with Saru president Oregan Hoskins saying: “There comes a point where there is a need for renewal and in discussions with Paul and other stakeholders, there was a general sentiment that we had reached that point.”

The sticking point appeared to be South Africa’s poor record in the big tournaments — principally Hong Kong and the quadrennial World Cup. It is possible that the lemon had been squeezed dry and that Treu had no more to give the Sevens code; possible, but extremely unlikely because Treu is a deep thinker on the game and is held in the highest esteem all over the rugby world.

It beggars belief that Saru, having invested so much in Treu over the past decade, could not find a way to keep him in the system. There had been talk of placing him in the Springbok under-20 set-up, or of his working with Rassie Erasmus’s mobile coaching team. Instead, it seems he will be headhunted by another major Sevens team, probably England, who have just sacked their coach, Ben Ryan.

Because Treu achieved so much, the colour of his skin was never mentioned. Indeed, there was a time, not long ago, when the much-derided quota system seemed just another ancient anachronism. This week, however, Saru chose to reintroduce it at the lowest level of senior provincial rugby, the Vodacom Cup.

In Saru-speak, quotas have become “measurable targets” and a workshop produced the following statement: “All 14 provincial teams will be required to pick a minimum of seven black players in their match-day squads, two of whom must be forwards. A minimum of five black players will be required to start.” 

This attempt at social engineering has come about because the provinces got lazy. They thought no one was watching (which is often literally true in the Vodacom Cup), and gradually their teams got paler and paler.

It has been 14 years since the last all-white Springbok side took the field — against Wales in Cardiff in 1999. The then chief executive of Sarfu, Rian Oberholzer, flew over to tell the players and coaching staff that it must never happen again. This week, Heyneke Meyer’s team includes five players of colour in a squad of 23, two short of next year’s Vodacom Cup quota. It seems, then, that we have come a long way, but we still have a long, long way to go.