Currie Cup fixtures

Currie Cup Fixtures

After nearly a month of non-stop foot­ball, the FIFA World Cup ends on Sunday but fear not sports lov­ers, the South African domestic rugby com­pet­i­tion, the Currie Cup kicks off on July 9^th with week­end fix­tures lined up for just over three months.

Use our com­pre­hens­ive list of matches, times and loc­a­tions to keep up to date on all the Currie Cup action! Continued

Boks ‘huff and puff’ their way to defeat in Brisbane

Peter de Villiers

Boks ‘huff and puff’ their way to defeat in Brisbane
The Springboks suffered a dis­ap­point­ing 21–6 defeat to the Wallabies at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Saturday and although they remain at the top of the Tri-Nations log and nine points clear of nearest rivals New Zealand, the Boks still need at least a bonus point from their last match against the All Blacks in Hamilton on Saturday, to clinch the cham­pi­on­ship. Continued

Boks subdue Wallabies and other Sporting News from South Africa

Bryan Habana

Boks sub­due Wallabies to inch closer to Tri-Nations glory
The Springbok rugby team are rid­ing the crest of a wave at the moment and it seems at though noth­ing short of the Apocalypse can stop the Boks from win­ning this year’s Tri-Nations com­pet­i­tion after they defeated the Wallabies 32–25 at the Subaico Oval in Perth, Australia on Saturday. The Boks outscored their oppon­ents by four tries to three with fly­half Morné Steyn con­trib­ut­ing a valu­able 10 points with the boot.

The South Africans got stuck into the Australians from the get go and were already 12–0 up after just 10 minutes cour­tesy of tries from scrum­half Fourie Du Preez (con­ver­ted by Steyn) and centre Jaque Fourie. Steyn then added three more points six minutes later when the Wallabies were pen­al­ised for an infringe­ment, push­ing the score to 15 without reply ... Continued

This Week in South African Sports

Caster Semenya

South Africa pin­ning hopes on Caster Semenya in Berlin
The 12^th IAAF World Athletics Championships in Berlin are well under way and there have been some phe­nom­enal per­form­ances on dis­play with Jamaican sprint­ing sen­sa­tion Usain Bolt’s unbe­liev­able 9.58 secs in the 100m final, undoubtedly the pick of the bunch. However, the South African con­tin­gent have struggled to achieve their poten­tial in a fiercely com­pet­it­ive envir­on­ment, with medal hopes LJ van Zyl, Sunnette Viljoen and Ruben Ramolefi fail­ing to pro­duce the goods when it coun­ted most.

Van Zyl was blown away by the com­pet­i­tion in the first of Sunday night’s 400m hurdles semi-finals, clock­ing an ordin­ary 48.80 secs for sixth pos­i­tion. Continued

Boks down Wallabies to keep unbeaten record — and other sporting news

Victor Matfield

Boks down Wallabies to keep unbeaten record
The Springboks con­tin­ued their rich vein of form in this year’s Tri-Nations com­pet­i­tion when they defeated Australia 29–17 at Newlands in Cape Town on Saturday after­noon. Bok fly­half Morné Steyn once again had an out­stand­ing game, slot­ting seven pen­al­ties and a drop goal for a per­sonal tally of 24 points. The Bok win was set up by another dom­in­ant dis­play by their pack of for­wards with the lock pair­ing of Victor Matfield (pic­tured left) and Bakkies Botha prov­ing par­tic­u­larly det­ri­mental to the Wallabies. The tower­ing duo dom­in­ated the lin­eouts secur­ing ample pos­ses­sion for their team and starving the Wallabies of this crit­ical com­mod­ity in the process ...

The Wallabies struck first with a quick fire second minute try from full­back Adam Ashley-Cooper, which was con­ver­ted by fly­half Matt Giteau to put the vis­it­ors 7–0 in front. However, the Boks remained calm under pres­sure and respon­ded soon after­wards with a well-taken try from ‘Man of the Match’ Matfield who chased a superb left footed grub­ber kick Continued

South African Sports Wrap — 5^th August

5 August 2009 – This week in South African Sports – Guy Mortimer reports on what’s been hap­pen­ing this past week and what’s com­ing up!

Caster Semenya

ASA announce crack squad for Berlin
Athletics South Africa (ASA) on Tuesday announced a team of 25 men and six women for the IAAF World Championships in Berlin later this month. The team includes top ath­letes such as 800m run­ner Caster Semenya (pic­tured), LJ van Zyl, who has been sen­sa­tional in the 400m hurdles this year, 1500m com­pet­itor Johan Cronje, 3000m steeple­chaser Ruben Ramolefi, javelin thrower Sunette Viljoen, 110m hurd­ler Lehann Fourie and, of course, Beijing Olympic long jump sil­ver medal­list Khotso Mokoena. The team atten­ded a train­ing camp in Potsdam in July and have been sharpen­ing their skills at another venue in Neubrandenburg. All the ath­letes will be com­pet­ing today at a meet­ing in Spandau to determ­ine their fit­ness levels before the World Champs ... Continued

The Week that was in SA Sports — Sports Wrap

22 July — The week that was in South African Sports and what's com­ing up — by Guy Mortimer

Oscar Pistorius

Oscar still fall­ing short
Twenty-two-year-old double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius fin­ished a respect­able fourth in the 400m event in Velletri, Italy, on Saturday. The Pretoria-based Pistorius, aptly nick­named the ‘Blade Runner’ due to his car­bon fibre pros­theses, was hop­ing to qual­ify for next month’s World Athletics Championships in Berlin, but his time of 47.42 sec was 1.87 sec adrift of the dif­fi­cult 45.55 sec qual­i­fy­ing standard.

Consequently, Pistorius will prob­ably have to wait until 2010 to qual­ify for a major able-bodied event as there are no more global cham­pi­on­ships tak­ing place this year. However, he still has till August 3 to make the South African team for Berlin and had the sat­is­fac­tion of defeat­ing seasoned Mauritian run­ner Eric Milazar on Saturday - albeit by a mere one hun­dredth of a second. The race was won by Michael Mathieu of the Bahamas in 46.81 sec ... Continued

Tri Nations is looming large ...

Photo © SA Rugby

As a nation, South Africans are pretty much sports crazy and the Tri Nations* is loom­ing large once again. Drinking beer, eat­ing biltong and watch­ing rugby go hand in hand so we thought it appro­pri­ate to give a few options of great rugby watch­ing ven­ues.  If you haven’t been lucky enough to get a test match ticket then watch­ing the action sur­roun­ded by friends in a pub is the next best thing!

Johannesburg has a great num­ber of ven­ues on offer.  The Keg and Filly on Rivonia Road in Sunninghill (+27 (0)11 807‑5590) is a pop­u­lar water­ing hole for many, so it might be advis­able to book a table ahead of schedule. If you live in Bryanston, what about try­ing The Baron Bryanston (+27 (0)11 706‑0632), loc­ated on the corner of Main Road and Post House Road?  The Baron has a tra­di­tional bar but the new look Manhattan Grill prom­ises a deli­cious din­ner after the game ... Continued