With the annual rugby clash between College and Bishops being “om die hoek”, here are some memories prompted by members of the College ist VX which in 1978 beat Bishops 9-4 in Cape Town.
Peter Amm said:
“Narrowly beating Bishops still remains one of my sporting highlights at College.
“I only played for the Ist XV from July having practised with them all year as a member of the 2nd XV. The Ist XV team members were my heroes!
“The coach of the Seconds was Harry Birrell who had us very fit and competitive.
“We actually beat the Firsts in a highly-charged tight practice. I remember clearly thinking that at the next tight practice the Seconds would be slaughtered by the Firsts. They were! But I was lucky and had been called up to the Firsts by then.
“Now that I am back assisting at College there is this overriding motivation to try and ensure the pupils of today have the same opportunities we had. Lower remains iconic – war cries are off the charts and the gees is excellent!!”
Stafford Poyser said:
“The three musketeers – Peter Amm, Nicky Whyte and myself were all from the unbeaten Prep U12A and U13A teams – became the four musketeers when Tic de Jager joined us from the U15As (they only lost one match).
“We all made the College 1st XV in 1978 and played together right through to the end of 1980.
“In 1980, brothers Peter and Philip Amm became the first and only College half‑back combination — Peter at scrumhalf and Philip at flyhalf — where both went on to play SA Schools cricket. A brother combination at that level? That will never happen again.
“Then there was Baart Tawse – our other wild man, who later operated in Somalia and other hot conflict zones around the world. On tour in Cape Town he was once stopped as he tried to put his foot under the tyre of a moving car.
“Baart, why are you doing that? You’re going to smash your foot and won’t be able to play!”
“His reply: “No man, my foot was itchy!”
Stafford also has an anecdote about the legendary Danie Craven.
“We met Dr Danie Craven and his dog Bliksem (not sure if it was Bliksem I, II or III) in Stellenbosch before our match against Paul Roos.
“He guessed each player’s position just by looking at us. He also and told us how he introduced the idea of koshuis (residence) rugby at Stellenbosch University based on the inter- house rugby system at College from his time teaching there.”
Some of Stafford’s other memories of the 1978 team which he played for while in Standard 8 and then continued to play for the 1st XV without missing a single match up to the last match on tour in matric in 1980, are as follows:
“Steve Ball, our captain, was our wild thing. We would have run through a brick wall for him. His attitude rubbed off on Tic de Jager (then only in Std 8), who once put Graeme’s huge Craven Week representative out of action from the blind side of a scrum — all without the ref seeing a thing. We went on to win that match easily.
“Before one match Steve all forced all of us to have cold showers “to wake up.” The matrics were furious — they weren’t used to cold winter showers.
In the change room, during the huddle, Steve, standing alone in the middle, would hit a teammate, and if you didn’t hit him back harder than he hit you, you were in trouble.
“Doc Rabie, Chaka Embling and the other big boys used to jump so high their heads smashed into the ceiling tiles. Then we were ready to run out onto Lower and do battle.
Our opposition called us “Snoozles,” so we were permanently motivated. We had an unrepeatable code word, if called we would tear into the opposition.
“Before running down to the Lower change rooms, we’d gather in the 15‑bed dormitory in Upper to lie quietly and focus.
Most of us had played in junior teams that had always beaten Kingswood, so we were very confident on K‑Day. But while lying there in the Upper dormitory, we suddenly heard the 2nd XV scoring a spectacular try — Lower erupted. The roar was thunderous. We all sat bolt upright in our beds and suddenly realised: this was going to be a serious match. College ended up winning 6–4. “Decades later, in Sydney, Australia, I met the Kingswood head boy who was captain at that match, Bert Rayner. He showed me a photo of the two of us chasing the ball – him trying to score, me trying to stop the try. Fortunately, he didn’t score.”
Leave a Reply