Mandela, Lomu and a Rugby World Cup final that went beyond sport
It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, on 24 June 1995, when New Zealand and South Africa walked down the Ellis Park tunnel and out into the magical light of a winter’s day in Johannesburg. Fifteen men were dressed all in black and 15 men wore green, gold and white. They obviously had no idea then that 28 years would have to pass before these two giants could face each other again when it matters most – in a World Cup final.
This Saturday in Paris, the All Black and Springbok squads will emerge from the tunnel at the Stade de France with the knowledge that the two countries they represent have each won the World Cup three times. By the time the next tournament begins, in 2027, the World Cup will have been in the possession of either New Zealand or South Africa for 24 successive years.
The 1995 final, however, went beyond sport. It felt historic. A World Cup final in the new South Africa, in the South Africa of a free Nelson Mandela, felt like a fresh beginning. It felt like the end of apartheid in the last area to surrender – rugby.
President Mandela, demonised for so long as a terrorist, followed the players on to the pitch. Unlike a career politician, Mandela had dressed for the occasion. He wore a Springbok shirt with the No 6 on his back. It was the shirt Francois Pienaar, South Africa’s Afrikaans captain, had sent to him. A smiling Mandela, who was 76, doffed his Springbok cap.
I am a South African. I was born into apartheid and grew up in a country which had jailed Mandela for 27 years. And so it felt profoundly moving to then hear the chant that gathered in booming intensity: “Nelson … Nelson …
Nelson …”
Sean Fitzpatrick, the New Zealand captain, led him down the line of All Blacks. When he reached Jonah Lomu, Mandela stopped. He looked up at the 6ft 5in Lomu, who packed 18 stone of muscle and thunderous power on the wing, and said: “You! You are the one!” Lomu nodded shyly. Having just turned 20, he had obliterated every team he had faced in the World Cup and become rugby’s first genuine international celebrity with a fame so sudden and so shocking it spread from South Africa to countries which had never played rugby.
Mandela was enjoying himself enormously and, as he lingered, Lomu flexed the muscles in his neck. You could tell that big Jonah was impatient for his first big hit and run in the sun.
I became friends with James Small, the Springbok wing who marked Lomu that day. Small loved boxing and the crime novels of Edward Bunker. In 1997