Craven Week kicks off
• Schools rugby tournament downsized to 18 teams
The 2018 edition of the Craven Week schools rugby tournament will be hosted at Paarl Boys’ High from Monday until Saturday, in celebration of the school’s 150th anniversary.
The annual tournament, in its 55th year, has been downsized to 18 teams, with Zimbabwe, Namibia, Eastern Province Country Districts (EPCD), Griquas CD and Border CD all being relegated to the Academy Week.
Four matches are scheduled for day one, with the Griffons first up against a Bulls XV.
Border then take on Limpopo before 2017 winners Golden Lions tackle 2014 winners Eastern Province, which was the first triumph for Eastern Province in 37 years.
Hosts Western Province (WP) and Pumas will contest the main game. These teams met at the same stage in 2017 and it was WP, the unbeaten 2014 and 2015 unofficial champs, who ran out victors.
But the Mpumalanga-based Pumas are tough nuts to crack and would love nothing more than to put one over on the Cape side that is again loaded with players from the Boland Region.
“The Pumas are a hard lot who play a very physical game and definitely do not take a backward step for anyone, so we have prepared for such an occasion and let’s see how things pan out,” said WP rookie coach Faizel Adam. “I’m confident we can make a winning start based on our pre-Craven Week results.
“We beat EP and South Western Districts comfortably in friendly games that were our final trials. I can say some boys were unlucky to miss out on final selection, but those chosen to represent WP have been working hard on our game plan and are now primed and ready to deliver a positive start.
“But we are under pressure to do so, being the host team.”
WP will also field a WP XV for the first time, to be coached by former senior KwaZulu-Natal player Clint van Rensburg.
He made it clear that his team are anything but WP secondstringers. “The selectors have dealt me a powerful squad as strong as anything out there.
“Any side that underestimates us does so at their own peril,” he said.
Van Rensburg’s charges face the Lions in the first of five matches on day two.
The Valke-Leopards take to the field next, then the BolandGriquas showdown followed by the Sharks-South Western Districts encounter.
The Sharks battled it out with the Golden Lions in 2017’s final in Johannesburg at St Stithians and were well beaten, while South Western Districts always punch above their weight, as shown by previous wins over the bigger unions including WP. Mighty Free State lock horns with the Blue Bulls in a clash of the big sides to close out the day. As usual, the Free State’s 24-man squad is dominated by players from Grey College, with 13 pupils included.
Grey College are ranked second behind Paul Roos of Stellenbosch in the unofficial national school rankings, both teams being unbeaten in 2018.
It must be said that Free State have not ended Craven Week as winners since doing the double in 2011.
The Bulls have failed to win the tournament since 2012.
It would come as a surprise if WP and Free State make it to the “final” on Saturday.
Free State beat Province on the final day in 2017.
Six players from 2017’s SA Schools team will be on view again. Two of them — WP’s Adrian Alberts and the Pumas’ Banele Mthenjane — captain their teams this year. The other four are Jordan Clarke (Sharks), Celimpilo Gumede (Sharks), Morné Brandon (Lions) and Diego Appollis (Bulls).
Other provincial players back for a second year include Ross Braude (Free State), Christie Grobbelaar (Boland), Dawid Kellerman (WP), Muzi Manyike (Golden Lions) and William Rose (WP).
No doubt the scouts from the big rugby unions will be on the lookout for new talent.