Bryan Habana announces retirement from all rugby
Springbok and Bulls legend and try scoring machine par excellence, Bryan Habana, announced his retirement from rugby.
The 34-year-old Bryan Habana, the second-most-capped Springbok of all time with 124 Test caps, announced that he will hang up his boots later this year.
Habana issued a statement on his Instagram account on Tuesday.
“It’s been more than a year of hoping, trying, pushing and willing to get back on the field for one last time, to taste the sweet victory or encounter that gut-wrenching despair. To hear the roar of the crowd or grab the pill out of the air. To make that last bone crunching tackle or score that last game winning try. But it’s unfortunately just not to be. I, like most, would have liked my career to have ended differently, but sometimes things don’t turn out quite the way we hope for. So, at the end of this season, it’s time to say goodbye and thank you to the game I so dearly love,” said the Springbok and Bulls legend.
Habana, a Rugby World Cup winner in 2007, made his Test debut against England at Twickenham in November 2004, when he scored the first of his 67 Test tries – the most ever by a Springbok.
He amassed 118 SupeRugby caps and scored 56 tries at this level in the colours of the Bulls and Stormers. He also played four tournaments for the Springbok Sevens team in 2004 and 2016.
Apart from the Rugby World Cup, Habana also tasted success in the Rugby Championship (previously named the Tri-Nations), SupeRugby and the Currie Cup.
He is the only player since rugby unity in 1992 who has won the prestigious SA Rugby Player of the Year Award three times – in 2005, 2007 and 2012. Habana was also named the World Rugby Player of the Year in 2007.
Provincially, before moving to Toulon in France in 2013, Habana played 21 times for the Golden Lions in 2003 and 2004, scoring 17 tries; 14 times for the Blue Bulls between 2005 and 2009, scoring nine tries, and eight times for Western Province from 2010 to 2012, scoring twice.
“We have been privileged to have witnessed the career of Bryan Habana, who will undoubtedly be remembered as one of the great legends of Springbok rugby,” said Mark Alexander, president of SA Rugby, in a statement after Habana announced his retirement.
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