When we were champions

How apt it is that France should be playing a rugby test match in Durban; nearly 10 years to the day that they and the Springboks contested one of the most amazing rugby games ever played.

The occasion was June 17, 1995, and Francois Pienaar’s Springboks were up against the French in the Rugby World Cup semi-final at King’s Park.

And what a day it turned out to be. No-one in living memory could remember a deluge the like of which struck South Africa’s sunshine capital. The field was literally a pool of water and, against a backdrop of intense drama that could have resulted in the Springboks forfeiting the match because of James Dalton’s sending off in the match against Canada in Port Elizabeth, the teams eventually took the field 90 minutes after the scheduled kick-off.

Recalling the match today it seems surrealistic; too far-fetched to have been true. The King’s Park field was more a brimming skid pan than a rugby field, the players were sliding about in sprays of water and yet they contrived to produce a match of epic proportions.

It seemed the Boks, who had started well, were in control thanks to a try by Ruben Kruger and Joel Stransky’s goal-kicking, but with Thierry Lacroix kicking superbly out of the sodden muck the French clawed their way back and seldom have a team been more grateful for having secured an early lead than the Springboks.

With time running out the Boks were leading 19-15 when André Joubert, his broken hand protected by a glove borrowed from the Irish game of hurling, finally made a mistake under a barrage of high balls from Lacroix and Fabian Galthie and put one down. The French charged in, Abdel Benazzi picked up the ball and thundered towards the line and seemed to have scored, but thankfully for the Springboks referee Derek Bevan was right on the spot and had seen that the big Frenchman had in fact lost the ball just centimetres short of the line.

Television replays vindicated the official’s ruling – revealing how the ball had squirted from Benazzi’s hand as James Small crashed into him right shoulder to right shoulder. It was not over yet as the Springboks had to survive a series of scrums on their line but their resolve held and when they won the turnover Joel Stransky was able to bang the ball away into touch to signal sheer joy for the South Africans and utter devastation for the French.

Later it emerged that big Kobus Wiese had grabbed hold of his tighthead and lifelong friend Balie Swart just before this heroic last defence of their line and shouted: “You can go up, and you can go down, but you’re not coming back!”

When it was all over, my match report filed to The Sunday Times, I sat shivering (in Durban!) in the media centre which had been set up in the Kingsmead soccer stadium, and caught the eye of former Wallaby lock Peter FitzSimons who was covering the tournament for The Sydney Morning Herald and we shook our heads simultaneously; incredulous at what we had just witnessed.

What a golden time it was. It had started on May 25 when the tournament kicked off at Newlands in Cape Town. This match, which seemed to capture and symbolize all the optimistic elements of what was then our untainted new democracy, remains my favourite test of the many I have seen.

Presenting the Rugby World Cup was to be one of the new South Africa’s biggest challenges and on an unforgettable day, when tears of emotion running down thousands of cheeks were a symbol of national pride as President Nelson Mandela declared the tournament open, the Springboks beat defending champions Australia.

That put the Springboks on what Kitch Christie had described as the “high road” and who will ever forget the journey as a month later Ellis Park provided the most tense, nerve-wracking, hand-shaking, leg-quivering, throating-drying sporting event most South Africans have ever experienced.

I remember the All Blacks playing superbly and adventurously as they tried to bring their awesome juggernaut, Jonah Lomu, into play. Keeping stats it seemed Sean Fitzpatrick’s black machine were on the verge of running rampant but the Springboks repelled every wave of attackers; with both Joost van der Westhuizen and Japie Mulder making stunning tackles on Lomu.

I could hardly bear to look; convinced that it would not be our day. After 80 minutes the scores were deadlocked at 9-9 and soon after the start of extra time, 10 minutes each way, All Black flyhalf Andrew Mehrtens, who had missed a golden chance to win the game with a dropped goal just before the end of regulation time, put the New Zealanders ahead, 12-9, with a penalty.

Joel Stransky, who was to score all the Bok’s points, brought the teams back on equal terms with a nerveless penalty as the clock reached 90 minutes and the teams changed over for the final, agonizing 10 minutes.

The crowd seemed to share my gloomy thoughts. They had gone strangely silent with tension when suddenly the ball was sent spinning back to Stransky, who steadied himself and sent the sweetest dropped goal soaring over the posts for the three points that would win the Webb Ellis Cup.

Ellis Park erupted into a kaleidoscope of swirling rainbow flags and stomping fans as South Africa geared up for the biggest party in its history. Soon President Mandela, still wearing the No6 Springbok jersey that had been his masterful act of motivation, appeared on the field and there was Francois Pienaar holding the trophy aloft and dedicating the victory not to the 65,000 in the stadium but to all 43-million South Africans.

Reminders of that magical day are still to be found everywhere – especially the bird’s eye view “where’s-Chester” photograph taken of Stransky’s winning dropped goal that sold tens of thousands of copies and made the photographer a rich man.

A long raucous night ensued in which it seemed every alley, road and shopping mall throughout the land was transformed into a giant street party. The banner headline on the front page of The Sunday Times said it all: “RAINBOW CHAMPIONS! Stransky’s do-or-die dropkick seals World Cup for our SuperBoks.”

I have kept a copy of that newspaper, dated June 25, 1995, which records and celebrates what was undeniably the greatest achievement by a South African sports team.

Thus ended an astonishing four weeks which had seen the Springboks, memorably dubbed the Amabokoboko by “The Sowetan” newspaper, live up to their slogan, “One Team, One Country,” by uniting a nation in the first year of a new democracy in a way few thought possible.

Having missed the first two World Cups, in 1987 and 1991, because of the anti-Apartheid sports ban South Africa did not return to the international fold until August 1992. That the Springboks won the game’s biggest prize just three years later is the stuff of myth or, as the Springbok team’s manager Morné du Plessis would remark: “It was ordained.”

A decade on the notion that some divine force was on the side of the Boks is not too fantastical. Every step of the way it seemed as though the fate had decreed that victory was in some way linked to South Africa achieving what was a miraculous new democracy.

First, the Boks lost Chester Williams, the “Black Pearl” of South African rugby, around whom all the hype had been built. Then his replacement, Pieter Hendriks, scored a dazzling try, rounding Australian talisman David Campese, to get the campaign off to a winning start on that paranormal day at Newlands and germinate the belief that the Boks might just be able to win rugby’s golden grail.

Next, Port Elizabeth. The floodlights failing, tempers fraying in the game against Canada. James Dalton as well as Canadians Gareth Rees and Rod Snow sent off. Pieter Hendriks cited. Both Boks banned.

But despair turned to joy as Chester Williams returned and scored a then record of four tries against Western Samoa in the quarter-final.

Then that downpour of biblical proportions in Durban and a game that nearly didn’t start because the referee considered the field too dangerous for play.

If that had happened the game would have been awarded to the French on the basis of those incidents in Port Elizabeth, but fortunately it went on, and providentially Abdel Benazzi came down just centimetres short of the Springbok line to miss a try that would have wrenched away the dream.

And then to Ellis Park. New Zealand. The All Blacks, South Africa’s keenest and most respected opponents. The Jumbo jet with the words “GOOD LUCK BOKKE” easily legible on the underside of its wings making two incredibly low passes over the stadium. President Mandela in Francois’ No6 jersey. Extra time. Joel’s stupendous dropped goal that meant that just two years after being re-admitted to international competition the Springboks were the world champions.

It was a fairytale then and 10 years later it seems even more incredible; making it even more sad that within two years five of the key role players, Francois Pienaar, Morné du Plessis, Kitch Christie, Joel Stransky and Edward Griffiths were no longer part of the inner circle of South African rugby.

In 1998 Louis Luyt, the man who with iron control ran an outstanding World Cup, would also depart and the harsh truth is that instead of seizing and building on the golden moment in which rugby, unified as never before, basked in the glow of public adulation the game’s administrators, some of whom are still involved, made a miserable mess of it.

“The dauntless spirit of resolution,” in the words of Shakespeare, was lost and 10 years on the colours are tarnished and the Springboks are a long way from challenging for the title of world champions.

But enough of that. At this time, when the players and their management have been forced to organise their own commemoration, let us recall the great deeds, remember those who have passed, and rejoice for a short while in the glory of when we were champions.

For the record, the squad who won the 1995 World Cup were as follows: FINAL:
Ellis Park, Johannesburg 24 June 1995
South Africa (9) (9) 15 New Zealand (6) (9) 12
South Africa:
15 André Joubert, 14 James Small, 13 Japie Mulder, 12 Hennie le Roux, 11 Chester Williams, 10 Joel Stransky, 9 Joost van der Westhuizen, 8 Mark Andrews, 7 Ruben Kruger, 6 Francois Pienaar (capt), 5 Hannes Strydom, 4 Kobus Wiese, 3 Balie Swart, 2 Chris Rossouw, 1 Os du Randt.
Reserves: 16 Gavin Johnson, 17 Brendan Venter, 18 Johan Roux, 19 Rudolf Straeuli, 20 Garry Pagel, 21 Naka Drotske.
The rest: Robby Brink, James Dalton, Pieter Hendriks, Marius Hurter, Krynauw Otto, Adriaan Richter, Christiaan Scholtz.
The management: Manager: Morné du Plessis. Coach: Kitch Christie. Assistant coach: Gysie Pienaar. Doctor: Frans Verster. Physiotherapist: Evan Speechly. Media Liaison Officer: Edward Griffiths.
New Zealand:
15 Glen Osborne, 14 Jeff Wilson, 13 Frank Bunce, 12 Walter Little, 11 Jonah Lomu, 10 Andrew Mehrtens, 9 Graeme Bachop, 8 Zinzan Brooke, 7 Josh Kronfeld, 6 Mike Brewer, 5 Robin Brooke, 4 Ian Jones, 3 Olo Brown, 2 Sean Fitzpatrick (capt), 1 Craig Dowd.
Reserves: 16 Marc Ellis, 17 Simon Culhane, 18 Ant Strachan, 19 Jamie Joseph, 20 Richard Loe, 21 Norm Hewitt.