The schools of champions
The whole of South Africa is proud of the performance of the Springboks in winning the World Cup. Imagine how extra proud of them are the schools they went to, the teachers who taught them, the coaches who coached them.
Rugby is historically a schools game. The name is taken from one of the great public schools of England, Rugby School in Warwickshire. Schools have ever played a part in the game.
The colours the two teams wear in the final are school products – the white of England from Rugby School, the green of South Africa from Bishops.
Both the coaches – Brian Ashton of England and Jake White of South Africa – were schoolmasters.
Just for fun we list the Springboks with their schools in brackets. Grey College have the honour of having five in the match-day 22, not for the first time.
South Africa: 15 Percy Montgomery (SACS), 14 JP Pietersen (General Hertzog), 13 Jaque Fourie (Monument), 12 Francois Steyn (Grey College), 11 Bryan Habana (King Edward’s – KES), 10 Butch James (Maritzburg College), 9 Fourie du Preez (Affies), 8 Danie Rossouw (Rob Ferreira), 7 Juan Smith (JBM Hertzog), 6 Schalk Burger (Paarl Gim), 5 Victor Matfield (Pietersburg), 4 Bakkies Botha (HTS Middelburg), 3 CJ van der Linde (Grey College), 2 John Smit (captain) (Pretoria Boys High), 1 Os du Randt (Piet Retief).
Replacements: 16 Bismarck du Plessis (Grey College), 17 Jannie du Plessis (Grey College), 18 Johann Muller (Oakdale), 19 Wikus van Heerden (Waterkloof), 20 Ruan Pienaar (Grey College), 21 Andre Pretorius (Dinamika), 22 Wynand Olivier (Affies).
Then there were the others who went on this astonishing journey to the stars:
Gary Botha (Waterkloof), BJ Botha (Durban High School – DHS), Jean de Villiers (Paarl Gim), Enrico Januarie (Weston), Wayne Julies (Charleston Hills), Akona Ndungane (Hudson Park), Bob Skinstad (Hilton), Gurthro Steenkamp (Paarl Boys’ High), Albert van den Berg (Vryburg), Ashwin Willemse (Swartberg)
