Boishaai captain achieves
On Wednesday, 9 January 2013, Helen Zille, the premier of the Western Cape, congratulated Craig Corbett who in 2012 was the captain of the Paarl Boys' High rugby team.
The congratulations were not for rugby even though Paarl Boys' High ended as No.1 on the FNB Top 20 of rugby schools in South Africa. Corbett went to Leeuwenhof, Helen Zille's official home, because he was one of the top achievers in the Western Cape in the matric exams, which is a great achievement. But then he got nine distinctions in the exam, one of them for Latin which he did because of the challenge and the desire to know more.
Corbett, who went to Paarl Boys' High from Kenridge Primary, became the deputy headboy of Paarl Boys' High and the school's Dux. He went to the Under-13 Craven Week in 2007 and the Grant Khomo Week in 2010. Then he went to Craven Week in 2011 and 2012, each time as the reserve hooker to Chad Solomons, the SA Schools hooker from Paul Roos. Strongly built, Corbett was excellent not only in the basic skills required of a hooker but also in the loose where he was outstanding.
At one stage his mother approached the school to discuss Craig's future – should he study or should he set out to become a professional rugby player. He has accepted the school's advice and will be off to Stellenbosch University next year for a bachelor's degree in chemistry, a resident in Dagbreek. It is after all the university his father, the eminent cardiologist Clive Corbett, attended.
But rugby stays high on the curriculum and he will be turning out for Maties, possibly hoping to advance through the Varsity Cup.
