Final FNB Top 20 for 2005

Monnas on top

With much thought and searching, questioning and weighing, we have produced the final FNB Top 20 for 2005. In the end Hoërskool Monument of Krugersdorp are again out on top, as they have been all season.

We have started afresh and weighed each team before arriving at a group of 30. The group could, of course, have been bigger as many fine schools have been omitted in a land of many, many great rugby talents.

We then set about examining teams and their results. Because opponents vary so much we have tried to balance matches played with the calibre of the opposition, taking the teams in our group of 30 as a yardstick.

Obviously the more matches a team plays counts. After all more matches means more possible defeats. Obviously the better the opposition the greater the likelihood of defeat.

Florida, for example, played Monnas three times this year where many schools did not play them at all.

At the end of it all, we have come up with the final FNB Top 20 for 2005, below which we have some figures which go some way to explaining the rationale of our choices.

Congratulations to Monument and all the other schools who have given such joy on the rugby field this season.

The final FNB Top 20 for 2005:

1. Monument
2. Paarl Gim
3. Affies
4. Grey PE
5. Grey Bloem
6. Paarl Boys' High
7. Paul Roos
8. Waterkloof
9. Boland Landbou
10. Outeniqua
11. Daniël Pienaar
12. Maritzburg College
13. Queen's
14. HTS Middelburg
15. Kearsney
16. St Andrew's, Grahamstown
17. Nelspruit
18. Bishops
19. Westville
20. Pretoria Boys High

Those just fractionally below this 20 – in our opinion – are Dale, Drostdy, Florida and Oakdale.

The overall results of the schools are below. In brackets are the number of matches each played against other opponents in this group, in other words the nmmber of times their opponents were other top schools.