Pirates Rugby team wins Pirates Grand Challenge
Having to miss training or train less hours at times because of load-shedding, did not dampen Pirates Rugby First team's spirit.
Twenty-two years of chasing finally paid off for the Pirates Rugby Club’s team as they won the Pirates Grand Challenge League. The Pirates first team faced off against North-West University (NWU) Pukke on August 22 at the Alberton Rugby Club.
The first team beat Varsity Cup Champions NWU in the final 28–19. Tries were scored by Bryn Dean, Duncan Delport Jared Branco and Keagan Lailvaux kicked three penalties and two conversions. Man of the Match was number 3 – Anthony Gallagher. First-team captain Sheldon Terblanche said winning the challenge was a great achievement for them.
“It was a tough incline playing against the students who are fit, physically strong and just keep going. We had a lot of preparation going into this game and into the semi-final as well and I believe we stuck to our structures and we’ve done well. We put a plan together and executed it beautifully,” said Terblanche.
He added there was a point in the game where their fly half put a long kick over, which was about 60m, and when the opponents saw the ball flying through the poles and they were edged-up then Pirates knew they had an effect.
“The boys’ spirits lifted for a few minutes and within those few minutes, we scored a few trials and luck just turned our way. We carried on, put the throw down and we just backed ourselves. Coming towards the end of the game, they scored a trial run at the end. But we always knew with three minutes left, they needed to score two more times,” Terblanche described.
The captain said he had decided to stop playing last year but decided to give it one more go and was happy with the outcome. “It’s massive for us, our club and community and we have juniors looking up to us and hopefully one day, they will be where we were.”
Terblanche said it had been a great season and they looked forward to the gold cup which began on September 9 in Springs.
Assistant coach at Pirates Rugby Club George Makwena said he joined the club last year and has been with the club for one season. “We worked so hard during our pre-season and we had one goal in mind – to win the Pirates Grand Challenge in 2023.”
He said they managed to get about 150 players together at the training sessions and then when the season started this year, they had about 180 players on the field. “So we combined a lot of players to pay the friendlies beginning of the season in February. We made sure there were no senior or junior players but we all were equal here, well-balanced and we have a good ethos in the team.”
The assistant coach said selecting the team was tough because of strong competition and they had to cut down the total from 45 to 30. He said they managed to beat all the varsities home and away this year. He commended the rugby team for being humble and working hard. “At some stages, we have to practise from 08:00 to 10:00 waiting for load-shedding and sometimes we train for only an hour because of load-shedding.
“We had one vision – to win the Pirates Grand Challenge and we won it.”
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