I frequently drive past this billboard, it always brings a smile.
By way of explanation, three of our domestic rivals are the Natal Sharks, Free State Cheetahs and Northern Transvaal Bulls 🙂
My Southern Kings played their final 2013 super rugby match yesterday and yes, you’ve guessed it, lost. But winning was not the purpose of our foray into super rugby this year.
In fact our 3 wins and 1 draw (in 16 matches) was perhaps a better season’s performance then most had anticipated, although I did state on these pages (somewhere) that I would be reasonably happy with a point total of 25, we ended up with 24!
More importantly it galvanised, in the most part, local rugby supporters behind one team, a local team, OUR team.
Let me quote Cheeky Watson (the president of Kings rugby) in his programme notes..
… today is a day for all people of this glorious region to once again unite in spirit behind the team. No longer do they have to wear the colours of other provinces; no longer do they have to shout for Stormers, Sharks, Bulls or Cheetahs.
Today let us shout for the Southern Kings.
and a quote from me during yesterday’s game…
It’s so lekker (nice) to sit in a pub where every Kings move / pass / point is cheered and the opponents successes greeted with a stoney silence 🙂
My Kings now go into a dreaded home and away relegation / promotion match against the (once?) powerful Transvaal Lions, 1st game next Friday 26th July, we’ve tickets for that, I’ll keep you posted 😉
Boadicea's Chariot 
Hi Soutie
Just watched Sharks v Kings ‘live’, having set the box to record the game a week ago.
We’ve been away up North for the last four days celebrating our 39th Wedding Anniversary. I was certain that the UK sporting media would not share the result with me and that you were my only threat, premature-disclosure wise, so I have avoided the Chariot since yesterday..
I was a worried man after five minutes as the entire Sharks team seemed determined to pass the ball to their former team mate Waylon at every opportunity. When your first try went in to make it 0-5 I got slightly tense.
Whatever, It all turned out all right and the Beast scored a try! And gave an assist. And was pretty superb in general. As usual.
All credit to the Kings despite the 58-13 scoreline. I’m not sure yet if the play off games are going to be on Sky but I’ll be watching and cheering on the Kings if they are. The best of luck to them and to all of their fans.
You have earned and deserve another season of Super Rugby.
Soutie, I expect you know Froome won the 15th stage of the Tour de France today on the summit of Mont Ventoux. And England won a cricket match at Trent Bridge – just a week after Andy won Wimbledon. Whoopee! Hope your team does well on 26th.
Howzit JM
Congrats on your 39 steps (is there a song or a book there somewhere?) I see it’s rubies and gladioli next year, good luck.
Yes, we’ve had a great season, we the people of the Eastern Cape have shown SANZAR that their decisions to allow the Rebels (and perhaps the Force) entry to super rugby before us was the wrong one.
I expect the S.A. officials to now throw their not inconsiderable financial clout around (I’m told that about 75% of SANZAR revenue is generated here in S.A.) and insist that we(the Kings) be accommodated, even at the expense of one of the Aussie outfits!
I’m sure that we’ll have a full house next Friday (7pm kickoff.) It’s going to be a cracker, hope sky show it for you!
Good morning Sheona
We consider Chris Froome one of ‘ours’ There’s a lot of support for him down here, failing an absolute catastrophe it would appear that he’s got the title sewn up, good, he deserves it, he’s been the best cyclist on the tour for the last two years. So that’ll be another knighthood then?
I would have difficulty reveling in the tainted Ashes victory. Those runs ‘stolen’ by Broad turned out to be the winning margin. I’m both surprised and delighted that the Aussies confounded the critics and made a good game of it, I’ll be hoping for one all after Lords.
Bye the way, your ‘throw away’ comment about supporting Scotland rugby on one of my Kings post some time ago has stuck with me, I often think of it when watching my Kings playing 😉
Don’t tell me that the odd Aussie hasn’t refused to walk or otherwise offended the cricket code of fair play. I’ll be no Aussies were up in arms then either. 😉
Môre Jay
I can assure you that when A.B.de Villiers claimed a catch that blatantly wasn’t (v Eng?) i called for him to be dropped. I can also assure you that if the Aussies had won at Trent Bridge under similar circumstances then I’d be calling for an England win at Lords.
I read about the Broad incident, Soutie. The umpire was at fault, but isn’t there a third umpire with a TV screen somewhere? Was the batsman’s body blocking the umpire’s line of sight?
Yes Sheona there is, but he can’t arbitrarily interrupt a game to give an opinion, he has to be asked to do so. He can only be asked by one of the onfield captains or umpires, the onfield captains are only allowed 2 unsuccessful reviews and Clarke had used both of his!
Everybody (including Broad) new that Broad was out except the umpire it seems, Broad has admitted in interviews that he ‘stood his ground’ and whilst such unsportsmanlike behavior has been seen countless times in the past (and no doubt there will be many more examples in the future) to me it results in a hollow victory.
So, good for England, but make no mistake what goes around comes around, there will be few of England’s future opponents prepared to play against them “in the spirit of the game.”
Two reviews? Is that per day of play or per five-day test? Not very much if the latter. In tennis each player is allowed three per set and an extra one in a tiebreak.
Two reviews per innings in test match cricket and only one in 50 over games (none in T20’s)
The system is still in it’s infancy (the Indians refuse to use it!) The problem is that unlike tennis the review process takes so darn long, however with most matches theses days finishing well within the 5 days, time is not as much of an issue these days.(bad weather excepted of course) Perhaps increasing the reviews to 3 or 4 may an an option.
I understand that the ICC were unhappy with the performance of the hot spot technology at Nottingham (re Trott’s dismissal) and are meeting during this weeks Lords test to consider what changes, if any, can be made to improve the system.