March 2024
In a unique first, rising rugby school Noordheuwel will field two 1st XV’s for action on Saturday, 09 March 2024.
In George, home team Outeniqua faces the proper Noordheuwel 1st XV in a banana skin main match of the Outeniqua 101 Festival. The Kwaggas have just one u17 in their starting XV and as a bonus welcome back hard-working “yster” Michael Cronje.
The Nories main 1st XV packs quite a bit of firepower and as a plan they are turning to the acronym “LQB”, standing for lightning quick ball, which they will look to do to ignite their red-hot backline. The Krugersdorpers are looking for improvement after a disappointing first outing against Trio. The game does however contribute significantly towards their match-fitness.
Nories have also upped the ante in the development of the B and C teams in recent times. They are equally proud that 13 of their 15 starters have been with them since Grade-8 and that several of these boys started out as B-team players at the co-ed.
This extended development has resulted in the brave decision to field a 2nd XV containing seven 3rd XV starters as their 1st XV representatives in the NWU Prestige Series Cup match against Hugenote of Springs on the same Saturday. It was in no means intended to be disrespectful towards Hugenote, and its hoped that the glass half full will be endorsed. Nories will field a 2nd and 3rd XV for the NWU Cup tie against the Oosranders tie as well.
Furthermore there are confirmed rugby tours for B and C team players during the holidays as well:
u15 & u16 B / C, 3rd / 4th XV Camp Discovery
u14B Grey College
u14C Bergsig Academy
| TEAM | OUTENIQUA | TEAM | NOORDHEUWEL | ||
| 1 | Deven Kleingeld | u18 | 1 | Meyer Opperman | u18 |
| 2 | Ruan van Rensburg | u18 | 2 | Mpho Madisaotsile | u18 |
| 3 | Juan Kleinhans | u18 | 3 | Martin Nel | u18 |
| 4 | Ruben Rossouw | u18 | 4 | Alex Greeff | u18 |
| 5 | Ruart Curlewis | u18 | 5 | Xander Buytendag | u17 |
| 6 | Nicolas Duvenage | u18 | 6 | Andrew Lambert | u17 |
| 7 | Michael Cronje | u19 | 7 | Jaundre De Villiers | u18 |
| 8 | Gareth Maree | u18 | 8 | Brad Brown | u17 |
| 9 | Ellie Meyer | u18 | 9 | Ignatius Jantjies | u18 |
| 10 | Andrew Stopforth | u18 | 10 | Jeandre Uithaler | u17 |
| 11 | Kerwin Scott | u18 | 11 | Lindsey Jansen | u18 |
| 12 | Luca Potgieter | u18 | 12 | Jared Coetzee | u18 |
| 13 | Keenan Jantjies | u18 | 13 | Cheswill Jooste | u18 |
| 14 | Xavier Salmons | u19 | 14 | Jenemo Luiters | u18 |
| 15 | Virgil Pockpas | u17 | 15 | Jade Muller | u18 |
| 16 | Luhan vd Sandt | u17 | 16 | Brendan Naude | u18 |
| 17 | Marco van Sandwyk | u17 | 17 | Lian Jonas | u18 |
| 18 | Trent Huisaman | u17 | 18 | Ivhan Jv Rensburg | u18 |
| 19 | Henru Nell | u18 | 19 | Donovan Breedt | u18 |
| 20 | Jonathan Schutte | u17 | 20 | Daniel Joubert | u18 |
| 21 | Jay-Zee Olivier | u17 | 21 | Gideon Diederichs | u17 |
| 22 | Reshaan Damans | u17 | 22 | Kean Steyn-Shawe | u18 |
| 23 | Grant Savage | u17 | 23 | ||
| Coach | ABRIE MINNIE | Coach | BOTTER LOURENS |
@beet (Comment #29)
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@Die Ken (Comment #28)
Norie ways!
I mean no ways!
Beet, how much is NH paying you
?
@tzavosky (Comment #26)
It is a formal competition, all other school results here are taken into account, participating as a first XV. I think it is simple – it counts since there is no comments section.
@beet (Comment #24)
Yes, that would be the easy way out. But the dictun is the team that is fielded on a particular day as the 1st team is the 1st team – this regularly comes up when Grey Bloem plays Paul Roos on the same day that the SA Schools’team play with GC having several players in the School’s team. (“There is no comments section”!)
So it would seem to me Noordheuwel has broken the ranking formula with two contrasting results.
Would love to hear from BHP how his going to handle that from a stats perspective.
I thought the Nories backs came good and helped their team over the line. Did the damage early on although the score did get as close as 21-19 near the end.
Cheswill Jooste was so much more effective at 13 than he was at 11 last weekend. Big difference maker in the outcome of this game.
Also Jeandre Uithaler is a very natural kicker. He has a very fluent technique.
No.12 Jared Coetzee is underrated. He does such good work in matches.
My favourite player in this game and all the games I watched was the Kwaggas no.8 Gareth Maree. He had a blinder.
Kwaggas 12 Luca Potgieter is a big unit, who caught the eye. Will be good to see how his season goes
@tzavosky (Comment #23)
It’s an excellent question
I was thinking about it on Saturday evening. Beating Outeniqua in George deserves a 5 but losing to Hugenote from Springs is a Nil.
My guess is for the rankings, its easier to argue that they fielded a 2nd XV. They cannot use that reason in the NWU Prestige obviously.
I would like to know how Boishaaipa’s Rankings will factor the respective results of the two Noordheuwel 1st teams on the same day into the formula in terms of Category Points.
Any idea, Beet?
@SO (Comment #21)
Dankie
@Kantman (comment #20)
Noordheuwel 28 – 19 Outeniqua
@kantako (Comment #19)
What was the score?
@jakes (Comment #18)
Noordheuwel 1st team won easily vs Kwaggas
@kantako (Comment #9)
Hugenote 28 -Noordheuwel 10
If Noordheuwel pull off two respectable results – I’m not saying wins yet – people are going to sit up and take notice. By the time the KES match arrives, they could have promoted high performers from the NWU squad…this is a ballsy way to build depth. Let’s see what transpires.
@beet (Comment #15)
Agree – but it is so early in the season that I can accept to be totally wrong.
@Kantman (Comment #14)
I kind of think that in the minds of most people Nories will be underdogs in George.
That translates to expected to lose this one.
The difference from last year is their profile is definitely on the up so while not much expected last year, this year this this is billed as a tough game for Outeniqua
Banana skin for Noordheuwel – travel and expectations is a dangerous combo.
@Roger (Comment #11)
Agreed. That KES vs Boishaai game was good.
@Pamos (Comment #7)
I know nothing about Nordheuwel unfortunately. In fact, I’m rather surprised KES are playing them and not Monument as KES have a long history against Monument (going back to 1978). I would expect KES to win but reading the comments here it seems Nordheuwel are highly rated and crucially will have a few games under their belt already. A real banana skin for KES
@beet (Comment #8)
Yup, they coming in cold. Similar to last year where they hit Paarl Gim at Noord-Suid with no match practice and got rolled. Two weeks later they lost by 2 to Boishaai (that was a cracking game)! Fixture list says 14 games with an inter schools to Westville (mini-tour) but no Cape or Grey PE festival this year. Playing Grey Bloem at Noord-Suid, Boishaai and Bishops at the KES festival and Affies, Jeppe, College, Westville, PBHS etc in regular season. As highly rated as they are – they need to hit their straps early for those first four games!!
@kantako (Comment #9)
Sjoe! 20 point spread against the Kwaggas in George is a big ask. Nories played well there last year and they are certainly going to have their chances tomorrow but a 3-score game should earn you a high return if a betting house was somehow involved.
@jakes (Comment #5)
Nories 1ste and 2nd team will be full of recruited scholarships, like all schools in Noordvaal A pool. Nories grade 11 and 12 ages will probably have 20 Lions players combined and 2 SA schools players.
Hugenote might have 1 or 2 Valke players.
Along with great coaches at Nories I predict they give Kwaggas a 20 and Hugenote a 30.
@Roger (Comment #6)
Rog, the Red Army are going to be running the gauntlet for that Nories game.
I understand this is the first of four big games and they want to stay as fresh as possible but they really needed to have some sort of starting game before Nories, who are bound to be well tuned by next Saturday.
A big ask to start a season against a very respectable team who would have had two competitive by then.
I also noticed that KES do not have a tour this year based on their fixture list. Coaches normally love these for growing team spirit.
@Roger (Comment #6)
Well who should win? KES as its an all-boys school. Do you think they are favorites to win?
@Pamos (Comment #4) so Nordheuwel play KES on 16 March which is a first for both schools and the first hit out this year for the very highly rated KES 1st XV. About 7/8 players returning and were very strong at U16 level in 2022. Who’s gonna win?
Nories ‘2nd team’ might get a lekker hiding if they estimate Hugenote Springs in the NWU cup. Maybe Nories must go and have a look at Hugenote vs Transvalia score last weekend. Big surprise. Just saying
@SO (Comment #3)
Awesome! This Noordheuwel team is going to be one of the teams of the season I think.
@Pamos I don’t know about the Outeniqua team but in the Noordheuwel team 19 out of the 22 players were there since grade 8
@beet This is going to be an exciting match-up! I know you have done Boosters for the KZN teams but it would be interesting to see how many boys these two teams brought in. I see one name that stands out: Xander Buytendag, I am sure he was at Menlopark last year.
Why is Noordheuwel still playing in the NWU cup? They have been dominating this tournament the last few years.