Selling the game to the people

Pre-season negativity about the Stormers chances in the Super 12 is becoming almost as big a Cape tradition as the anti "Vaalie" sentiment which prevails when roads are clogged by Gauteng registrations during the festive season.

"The Stormers are going to get such a klap this year, I really fear for them," was just one of the comments heard near the press box as we waited for the friendly against the Northern Bulls to kick off last Saturday afternoon.

When there was disagreement over this view, some hand-shaking was done and a few bets were laid. The gist of it was that both coastal teams, the Stormers and the Sharks, were going to foot the table this year, with the Bulls and the Cats flying the South African flag.

Just where this all came from was difficult to figure, although last year's Currie Cup might have had something to do with it. In my experience it normally takes just a couple of games for the doom merchants to change their minds and I whispered as much to a colleague sitting near me: "I am not saying the Stormers will win the competition this year, but they will be competitive.

Maybe it will once again be a mid-table finish, but they definitely won't be last." I have learned from experience that making bold predictions of what might happen in the Super 12 is a perilous business. One year I predicted the Sharks would be in the final, and they came last. The following year I predicted they would finish near the bottom and they ended up losing the final to the Brumbies.

It is a fact that we do not really have enough to go on in terms of team form in January and early February to predict with any certainty what will happen to them during a tough competition like the Super 12.

There are always the inevitable injuries, and we have seen often enough how teams that start well and lead in the early stages suddenly implode and drop to the bottom of the table.

But within 10 minutes of the start of the Newlands pre-season friendly, I found myself wishing that I had been a little louder in my assertion and had perhaps joined others in putting my money where my mouth is.

For that is how long it took for all the negativity to be swept away and to be replaced by eager optimism. As the Stormers surged irrepressibly back onto the attack and put Robbie Fleck in for his second try in the 12th minute, one of the newly converted optimists shouted out to the man he had been arguing with just half an hour earlier: "That is the easiest 100 bucks you will ever make."

Heck, and it is only January, and the Stormers were only playing a friendly with a half-strength team against another half-strength team. It would be foolish to read too much into a game played so early in the year and so meaningless to the Super 12 standings. Suffice it to say though that both teams had a lot to be positive about after a match which was played at a furious pace and retained its intensity from start to finish.

Allow me to say that the Stormers did show enough to vindicate my view that at the very least they will be competitive. The big guns were not playing, but Pierre Uys' performance on the flank coupled with a brilliant game from Eagles No8 Jaco Gouws was enough proof of the depth the Stormers boast in this area (maybe they don't need Rassie Erasmus after all).

With Tjoepie van den Heever playing a blinder at hooker and youngsters Pat Barnard and Eddie Andrews doing their bit, the Stormers pack showed that the problems the WP scrum experienced last year need not be considered terminal.

Lean van Dyk, the Namibian fullback now available for Super 12 action, played solidly enough at fullback to suggest Percy Montgomery won't be missed (remember Werner Greeff is also available) and Chris Rossouw, when his pack is going forward, is a fine attacking flyhalf.

Then there was young Schalk Burger, the son of the former Springbok lock. The blond flanker may not play much Super 12 this year, if at all, but watch him go in the Currie Cup later this year. He will be a big one, mark my words.

Another player who is going to make a significant contribution in time is young Bulls scrumhalf Fourie du Preez. If he plays like he did on Saturday throughout the season then maybe Joost will find it tough getting back into the team.

The pacy Eddie Fredericks played an impressive game on the wing for the Bulls, as did fullback Riaan van den Bergh. The top Bulls centres were not in action, but the Pretoria team did show plenty of flair and need not be the one-channel combination that won the Currie Cup last year.

But as it is so early in the season, all of this gush does need to be tempered. Yes, I know, we could be singing a very different tune a few months from now. The one thing we can be certain of after Saturday, however, is the immense popularity of rugby in the Cape. Who would have believed two understrength teams could draw over 40 000 people to a friendly match?

The rush for tickets on match day was such that the kick-off had to be delayed for quarter of an hour, with the gates eventually being opened to prevent a crush and patrons being admitted free of charge.

Not that those early arrivers who paid had to part with much cash. Tickets for this game cost just R5, which should explain why there was such an interest.

It was a clever move on the part of the Stormers to charge such a nominal fee as it was clear that several of the people at the match were new to live rugby. This was illustrated when a cricket official acquaintance pointed out later that evening that several thousand people had pitched up at Newlands cricket ground earlier in the day (a World Cup dress rehearsal was in progress) thinking that it was the rugby stadium.

Like the Peoples Day on the last Monday of a rain-interrupted Wimbledon tournament, the newcomers contributed a different atmosphere. Conversion kicks were greeted with the enthusiasm with which they would a kick for goal in a Super 12 or Currie Cup final, the tries were greeted with an ecstatic raw which reverberated off Table Mountain.

As an outreach exercise with the purpose of attracting newcomers to the game it was an outstanding success and was a wonderful way to get the Newlands vibe going as we head into another important rugby year.

Maybe it is something the Stormers/WP should introduce as an annual event as their version of the successful Open Day staged by the Sharks in Durban at the start of every season.

Those who go to Newlands once should be seduced enough by the atmosphere to want to go back again. Contrary to popular opinion, it is not the player who is the most important person in rugby, but the fan. And the more of them that can be attracted to the sport so much the better for the future of the game.

The only problem I foresee is the scurrilous Cape newspaper headline on the eve of the Stormers/Sharks match, when admission to Newlands will cost R80 rather than just R5: "Fans outraged at 1600% price increase!".