The Craven Week is not what it used to be

I’m not going to be at the Craven Week this year. I’ve been to the last 16 weeks in a row, and to 27 of the last 30, so it will be a little strange, and I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to some serious FOMO.

Then again, I’ll be watching the games on TV, in the warmth, far away from what the late Zandberg Jansen called “Bloemfontein se eie-sortige vrek koue” (Bloemfontein’s unique deathly cold) and there’s a lot I won’t be missing.

I’m afraid the Craven Week is just not what it used to be – and I think I’ve earned the right to that opinion. The change was slow and insidious. It began after Danie Craven’s passing in 1993, when his insistence that this was a festival, with no overall winner and no individual honours was undermined, then ignored. The professionalisation of the game after the 1995 World Cup didn’t take long to trickle down to this level and, while that was a good thing in terms of conditioning and preparation, it brought an emphasis on winning that was never very healthy.

At the same time, unification happened, and transformation began, those were obviously good things, but the attitude of those running the game in the provinces never kept pace (some still haven’t fully accepted it) and that has led to a set of evils which are a topic of their own.

In around 2000 the age cut-off for the week was changed from under-19 to under-18. That was a development which would have deep consequences. It meant that most players now have one Craven Week only. Earlier, many of them played twice, and some even three times. There was an immediate drop in the number of standout players at the week. It was about experiences (and an extra year of muscle growth) and the biggest stars in my early years were those who were at their second or third weeks.

At the schools around the country, repeating grade 11 was quite a common practice for star rugby players in those days. But, if there was no chance of playing at the Craven Week in matric, there was little point in that. So, instead of ensuring that your first team would remain competitive by keeping your own players for an extra year, the schools began looking for players elsewhere, and the curse of poaching and recruitment had its origin right there.

And then, while we were not paying attention, SuperSport hi-jacked the whole thing. Their relationship with SA Rugby made them all-important. They weren’t interested in broadcasting a wishy-washy traditional festival, so the current format, with the first round of matches serving as quarterfinals for the top eight seeded teams, followed by semifinals and a final was, undoubtedly, made for television.

The rest of the teams at the week are fillers now – there to pass the time until the real action begins. And I, along with my print media colleagues, didn’t count for much either. I remember the 2000 week in Port Elizabeth where there was a round of matches at township venues. The TV people arrived the week before and selfishly set themselves up in the limited accommodation, forcing us to spend the day on the stands in the blazing sun and howling wind. All the games are televised and they kick off when the TV producer says so. Tough luck for the paying spectators and the printed schedule.

While this was going on, the professionalisation of the game continued apace. All the big unions set up stall at the week, with their university partners in tow, and contracting players became the biggest game in town. The dropping of a national under-19 interprovincial competition and SARU’s cap on the number of players that can be contracted will put the brakes on that, of course, and it’s going to be interesting to see how that will change the dynamics.

So, in it’s 45^th year the Craven Week bears little resemblance to what it used to be. Better or worse? Who am I to say? I just am glad that I’m sleeping in my own bed this week.