Legendary Kwaru captain Bomza Nkohla revolutionised No 8 play

HE was an inspirational captain, a link between the forwards and backs as a No 8, and often kicked to touch!

That was the way Zola Yeye described Kwaru and Saru rugby legend Welile “Bomza” Nkohla, who passed away in Port Elizabeth on Sunday from cancer. He was 71.

Nkohla played in seven “Tests” as captain of the SA African Rugby Football Board team in 1968-69, and a few years later, his club Orientals broke away from the organisation with other clubs to form the KwaZakhele Rugby Union (Kwaru), which played under the auspices of the non-racial South African Rugby Union (Saru).

There he came up against the likes of Western Province and Saru captain Salie Fredericks – who died recently – as well as legendary WP scrumhalf Cassiem Jabaar.

“I know Bomza very well. He was an inspirational captain in his day for Orientals Rugby Football Club. Very inspirational. He played at No 8, one of those dynamic eighthmen who would play loose and join the backline and be all over the field,” Yeye told IOL Sport.

Yeye was a flying wing for Kwaru and Saru in the 1980s himself, and the Springbok team manager from 2006-07.

“Bomza was part of the great 1971 Kwaru team that became part and parcel of Saru, 71-72 – with Peter Mkata, Temba Ludwaba, Joseph Tshume and Phakamile Lubambo.

And if you think All Black great Zinzan Brooke revolutionised No 8 play by kicking to touch, Nkohla beat him to it.

“He would move from the back, and it was ‘You see me now, and you see me all over’. Bomza had a great boot also. In those days, he would kick long touches, and he was that kind of eighthman who would pull back and cover for the backline at the back, and bring that movement from the back. He was a great player,” Yeye said.

“The Zinzan you saw on television was more or less the Bomza that we knew in his heydays. He would kick to touch, he did everything. Very mercurial No 8.”

When he died on Sunday, he was a selector for the Southern Kings.

“Greats like Bomza, Salie Fredericks and Cassiem Jabaar set up a fertile platform for our youngsters to be great sportsmen and ambassadors of the game, added Yeye.

Current Saru president Mark Alexander paid tribute to Nkohla, saying: “Unfortunately, he did not have the opportunity to display his vast talent on the international stage because of the political situation in our country, but he is a former national captain and will be remembered as an uncompromising loose forward who had a huge love for South African rugby.”