KZN

Kearsney’s rugby season begins with a short warm-up game against the hosts at the KFC Voortrekker Night Series on Friday 28 February. Thereafter they depart for their annual Northern Natal tour where they have lined up fixtures against Vryheid on Monday 03 March and Pionier on Wednesday 05 March. That makes it three reasonably demanding early matches all within the space of five days.…

The Glenwood Invitational XV containing a nearly full strength Glenwood line-up had to dig deep to overcome a spirited 50-minute challenge from DHS before they run out 10-3 winners and claimed the Geldenhuys Broers Bedryf Night Series title for 2014. (Click here for match photos -> Cyndi@rugby)…

A postponed water polo fixture isn’t usually cause for celebration, at least not a Maritzburg College but in this case, the delay has provided Ryan Strudwick with a unique opportunity to field a fairly strong pre-season line-up for the school’s first run out of the year at the KFC Voortrekker Night Series.…

Westville plays the first of four preseason fixtures against host’s Voortrekker at the KFC Night Series tonight. Kick-off is at 19h30. They will follow this up with matches against Maritzburg College (Vories N/S on Friday 28 February), KZN Development and Clifton ( Wartburg Festival on 08 March).…

With the amounts of money that is now being ploughing in their rugby programmes, it has become essential for high schools to take added steps to protect their investments.…

At the end of February, Garth Giles (67) who was recently described as a coaching pillar in KwaZulu-Natal, will part ways with Natal rugby after decades of service as a player and employee of the rugby union. As far as schoolboy rugby in the province is concerned, Garth will also relinquish his responsibilities as the KZN under-18 Convenor of Selectors and Executive Committee member.…

DHS recorded a 17-3 win against Port Natal in the final game of the round-robin stage to book a place in the A-team final against the Glenwood Invitational XV on Friday, 21 February. It proved to be one of those uncompromising battles on the field between two well-matched team. DHS however used their opportunities well to scored three tries before the break and a scoreless second half.…

A big crowd is expected to descend on Port Natal’s floodlight main rugby field for the most crucial game of this year’s Geldenhuys Broers Bedryf Night Series, where host Port Natal and newcomers DHS will square off in the main game at 20h00 on 14 February to decide who plays the Glenwood Invitational XV in final.…

In terms of overall record, Maritzburg College is by a considerable distance the best performing rugby school in KwaZulu-Natal. With the help of the excellent records kept by former teacher Tony Wiblin, below are some stats per decade dating back to the 1940’s. …

Now in its seventh year, the 2014 Kearsney Easter Rugby Festival is certain to attract capacity crowds following the announcement that the event has again attracted many of SA’s top rugby-playing schools.

All 12 participating schools are renowned for their rugby pedigree and were widely regarded as being amongst the top teams in the country at the end of last season.Their participation reinforces the prestigious status of the Kearsney College festival. …

Former HJS Paarl Boys High School and SA Schools loose-head prop Thomas du Toit just got his matric results a few weeks ago and now he’s one step away from engaging in scrums against most of the very best front-row players that the Southern Hemisphere rugby has to offer. …

Here is some good news for those attending the Kearsney Easter Rugby Festival during April and actually also for anyone who like myself who might have once or twice in the past struggled to find a seat on Kearsney’s jam-packed main stand during one of the big KZN inter-schools derby days.  The Kearsney main stand, arguably the best school rugby stand in KwaZulu-Natal is being extended. The improvements will increase seating capacity as well the covered area.…

Hosts Port Natal gave the Glenwood Invitation XV a very good run for their money during the Round-3 of the Port Natal Night Series (sponsored by the Geldenhuys Broers Bedryf). The visitors scored 8 unanswered points in the last few minutes of the game to eventually run out 15-6 winners in the end but they were pushed all the way by a very determined White Knights team.…

The annual Port Natal Night Series sponsored by the Geldenhuys Broers Bedryf is in full swing. Three entertaining rugby matches were contested on Tuesday night, matchday 2 of the tournament.…

A brand new electronic cricket/rugby scoreboard on Goldstones is one of many sports related improvements that Maritzburg College has made in recent months. The scoreboard and the construction to support it was funded from donations from four of Maritzburg College Old Boy branches, namely Harding, Zululand, Midlands and Tugela, plus a contribution from the MCOB Association itself, totalling R100,000.…

Port Natal got their Night Series campaign off to a good start with a convincing win 22-0 win against Pinetown. However as a result of the final whistle being blown early, they missed out on the opportunity to earn a 4-try bonus point which could prove costly later in the series.…

It was predicted that this DHS versus George Campbell game would be the match of the opening evening of the Geldenhuys Broers Bedryk Night Series at Port Natal Hoerskool because it pitted two KZN top schools against each other and going by their results against shared opponents over the last few years everything pointed to them being fairly closely matched.…

Port Natal’s annual night series sponsored by tyre experts the Geldenhuys Broers Bedryf got off to a good start on Friday, 31 January. As usual a good crowd gathered and were treated to some much better than expected rugby for this time of the year. The A-team competition saw the Glenwood Invitation A team beating Durban Development 46-0.…

UPDATED: Glenwood has issued a release stating that Mike Vowles will be their new 1st XV assistant coach. There is no mention of HP director, so apologies for stating this as it now appears to be incorrect. The email mentions that Mike is also qualified as a History, Life Orientation and Technology teacher but does not state whether he has been employed as a teacher.…

If Christmas is the season to be jolly, rugby preseason is time for supporters to be optimistic. The actual season doesn’t always work out the way people planned though. That said Port Natal fans genuinely have cause to feel confident going into the 2014 season. Firstly their 1st XV has far more experience in terms of first team caps that the one that did duty last season. Also broadening the smiles on the faces of the support base was the successful set of trial chukkas held at the school 0n 17 January, merely one week into the new school year. …

In a nutshell organisers are finding it difficult to find a suitable date to fit in with the majority of schools. They haven’t given up though and if they can get most or some of the top schools to agree on a date, the event will go ahead.

Last year’s Top Schools Rugby Festival was the first of it’s kind for KZN and deemed to be a huge success by all who attended. 10 KZN schools participated in friendly preseason 20-min per half games. Hilton and Michaelhouse were the only absentees.…

The Clifton College intake for Grade 8 this year is in the region of 100 boys, making it by far their biggest class since the high school came into being. Doing the maths suggests that if they continue to enroll this many students every year, they will be up to 500 boys in the high school by 2018.…

What an eventful year 2013 turned out to be in terms of reporting news mainly about personnel changes in rugby-related posts at KwaZulu-Natal’s leading rugby high schools. So much happened last year. It seems almost impossible for 2014 to be as busy a year in this regard.…

Glenwood has added the last piece to the puzzle in their efforts to replace former Head Coach and Director of Rugby Sean Erasmus (now at Paarl Boys High). Last year experienced assistant coach Rudi Dames was promoted to head coach and late last week the KZN school issued a press release confirming that former pro rugby player Shawn van Rensburg had taken over the reigns as Director of Rugby.…

From the DHS website:

Durban High School (DHS), one of the oldest boys’ high schools in Kwazulu-Natal, is set to benefit from income on the investment of the proceeds of the sale of the property, which is currently occupied by the DHS Old Boy’s Club and some lessees. The property belongs to The Durban High School Foundation Trust.

The property, which is approximately 4,3 hectares (43 000 m²) in extent, is flanked by Marlborough Crescent and Gainsborough Drive in Durban North and is expected to realize above R45m.  …

The St Charles College (Pietermaritzburg) parent that sued his son’s school because they dropped his son as captain (asking the court to reinstate his son as captain) had his application dismissed with costs on Tuesday, 22 January 2014.…

Former Northwood 1st XV coach and current Durban youth rugby coach Donald Ngwenya has been appointed as the new DHS under-16 coach. This means he takes charge of DHS’s all-important 150th birthday 1st XV in 2016 group this season. No pressure! No ways! All the pressure in the world for sure.…

Westville who already have tremendous rugby depth in their open age group welcomed two new and very talented under-16 players from Hudson Park in East London into the fold late last year. Both boys were part of the highly successful Border 2013 Grant Khomo team that went through the under-16 tournament unbeaten, including defeating the always competitive Free State along the way.

These recruitments have not to go down well in the Eastern Cape. A positive movement to stop so called “poaching” has started to gain a lot of momentum in the Border region, where young players from less privileged backgrounds are increasingly becoming the targets …

Noel Ingle, the Chairman of the KwaZulu-Natal High School Rugby Association, has been named as an SA Schools Vice Chairman. Part of the duties include attending 10 meetings per annum where key issues regarding school rugby will be discussed and some important decisions made.…

Brandon Staples of Glenwood is one of KwaZulu-Natal’s best schoolboy rugby players. The big No.8 who is now under-17 has represented KZN at both under-13 and under-16 levels in the past. He is now very high up on England’s “must have” list. …

Current St Charles under-16A coach Deon Gericke has been appointed to replace Sean Erasmus as the KZN Craven Week assistant coach. In all probability Deon will work with the forwards while fellow newly appointed assistant coach Grant Bell (Westville) will handle the backs. …

This one will come as a huge surprise to those outside the Kearsney circle of rugby interest. The highly respected and humble Barend Steyn, Kearsney’s head coach ever since 2001 and by far the longest serving KZN tier-1 head coach, has made the decision to step down and allow his assistant Francois Lubbe to take up the reins. …