A long season ends
Tue, 24 Aug 2010 12:36
The try that Boland Landbou thought they'd scored against Oakdale
There are three tailpieces to the 2010 season in the Cape.
On Wednesday, at Boland Park in Wellington, the finals of the various Boland schools divisions will take place.
In the 14.00 game Berg River face Franschhoek's Groendal in the lower tier, followed at 15.30 by the middle category match between Hawston and Bredasdorp. On the face of it, this could be quite an interesting match, given that Bredasdorp are used to the rigours of Boland schools rugby at a fairly high level, but have not enjoyed a particularly memorable 2010.
Like all good hotdog sausages, their opponents, Hawston, are on a roll, having over the past few weeks beaten Hermanus and Gordon, the latter triumph seeing them through to this weekend's Die Burger Small Schools Final in Port Elizabeth.
The premier level final will see Schoonspruit, who qualified through the dubious criterion of having actually bothered to submit their match reports - something which the two or their mini-league opponents who beat them, Swartland and Augsburg Gym, overlooked - try their luck against big guys HTS Drostdy.
The Donkeys are expected to leave out their matrics in favour of fielding a shadow 2011 combination. If sanity and good form prevail, so will Drostdy.
On Wednesday at Goodwood RFC President play DF Malan at 17.45 at their annual Nite Rugby event. DF lost its interschools against Bellville High, but subsequently beat HTS Bellville. While Pressies fared well in their league matches, they found said Bellville High rather too hot to handle when they played them in a cross-league fixture. DF are tipped to take this one.
At 18.45 Milnerton and Durbanville should provide some entertaining rugby. Neither side has set the local scene alight this year. This is their belated opportunity.
The 20.30 finale features Paarl's Labori against Table View. You would be advised to get warmly dressed up just for this one, but, hey, if you're already there, you could do worse than stick around.
Hoërskool Framesby in Port Elizabeth hosts the finals of the Die Burger Competition on Saturday.
The Small Schools clash sees Eastern Province's powerful Itembelihle take on Hawston (busy week, hey, guys?), who will rely on their deft handling skills to outwit their opponents.
The Medium Schools game looks promising. Oudtshoorn have had two golden weeks, although a degree of sloppiness was apparent in the early stages against Despatch in Saturday's semifinal. Augsburg Gym from Clanwilliam have had a very impressive year, during the course of which they beat Die Brandwag en route to being declared Team of the Festival at Oakdale in March. A tough result to predict.
Paarl Gim have been resting their big guns ahead of the play-offs and it showed against HTS Drostdy last Tuesday during periods of which the Pride of the Western Cape seemed to be sound asleep. They will, however, be wide awake when they face Framesby in the Large Schools Final, which should bring down the curtain on a great year in style.
After that it's Sevens time!
By Tony Stoops
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