Some weekend highlights - big wins, narrow wins, and games where wins don't matter.

 

My sporting highlight of the weekend?

It’s hard sometimes, with so much going on, to get that warm and fuzzy feeling about just one thing, so please forgive me for listing a few.

Firstly there were two very meaningful one-point rugby victories.

KES beat Noordheuwel 23-22. While there has been some schadenfreude around our top rugby school having a rare bad year, I’m delighted that they got one back, and against a top school too. There is grit and resilience aplenty in that team, and they have a great captain. Things just haven’t been going their way, but they did on Saturday, good for them.

Later on, just down Joe Slovo Drive, the Lions beat the Ospreys 29-28. It hasn’t been a good year for them but they’ve stuck to their style of attacking rugby, often to their detriment. At least they got some reward for it on Saturday. I’m a tragic Transvaal/Lions fan – have been all my life – so any win’s a highlight for me.

I was at St John’s on Saturday where Jeppe’s 1^st rugby team beat a St John’s side seemingly more concerned with keeping the score down than scoring themselves. Not many highlights there, but up on the top field early in the morning I watched for a while a rugby game between two teams of the tiniest of tots. There were no posts and no scoreboard, the coaches were on the field, teaching, and the kids were smiling. It was great antidote for the dreariness that was to follow.

The big highlight of the weekend, though, has to be Jeppe’s victories in the Aitken and Boden Trophies. They also won the U16 Top 10 tournament earlier, and their U14s have yet to lose a game. I spend a bit of time around the hockey section there and, for me, the secret of their success is the classic formula:  talented players, good coaching, top-class facilities and a challenging fixture list. Added to that there is support from sponsors; a parent body (they call it the Hockey Patrons Association) that is right behind the boys; and a great family feel.

And orchestrating it all is Bryan Hillock, their indefatigable director of hockey, who instils a steely discipline and is always reminding everyone that “this means more”.

All of that is why they are so good. Their recruitment is good too, sure, but that’s not the only reason why no-one can touch them at the moment – as I heard from some disgruntled spectators at the finals on Sunday.