Stars who are making SA sport colourful

To all sports fans

It doesn’t happen often, but at the weekend the missus settled down next to me on the couch while I was watching the Stormers v Bulls Super Rugby match at Newlands.

She is no sports fan but I have noticed she will occasionally watch rugby – or something obscure like lawn bowls or archery – on TV when she has had enough of pottering around in the garden.

She rarely has much to say during these infrequent visits to the couch on a sporting Saturday, but she certainly was chirpy last weekend. “Jeez babe,” she said, taking a sip of her red wine, “I didn’t realise so many black players played in our Super Rugby teams. And did you see how many black spectators there are? That’s so cool.”

Usually she gets bored after 10 or so minutes and either dozes off or wanders away to bother the dogs, but not last Saturday. “These black guys are really good,” she said as Stormers captain Siya Kolisi went on another rampaging run.

That exchange got me thinking. I remember like it was yesterday following the Springboks’ exploits in the 1995 Rugby World Cup. Chester Williams was the only “player of colour” in the Bok squad and he was my favourite because of his try-scoring prowess.

I hadn’t really noticed what my

Guy Hawthorne

missus had raised, but once I took a good look I realised how right she was.

The Stormers had Kolisi, wingers Dillyn Leyds and Raymond Rhule, flyhalf Damian Willemse (for whom I predict big things), prop Ramone Samuels and No 8 Sikhumbuzo Notshe in their side. The Bulls’ line-up included fullback Warren Gelant, prop Lizo Gqoboka and No 8 Thembelani Bholi.

The report on transformation in South African sport that was released in midweek made reference to targets and percentages of those targets achieved by the various sporting codes.

Sports Minister Tokozile Xasa, in releasing the report, was well pleased with the results.

The face of our sport is changing and, what struck me, it is changing without us even noticing it.

The same has happened with our national cricket team with the likes of Kagiso Rabada, Temba Bavuma, Vernon Philander, Lungi Ngidi, Keshav Maharaj and Andile Phehlukwayo all established members of the national set-up. In fact, in the recent Test series against Australia, South Africa’s bowling line-up in the second Test in Port Elizabeth was Philander, Rabada, Ngidi and Maharaj.

It was a match we won thanks largely to the heroics of the bowlers and it set us up for a 3-1 win after we had gone 1-0 down the the fourmatch series.

The bottom line is, as long as your favourite team, be it provincial or national, is producing the goods on the park, who cares what colour the players are?

Or, to quote my missus: “I don’t care if they are green or purple or blue, as long as they play well and win.”

Damn right!