Congratulations Siyamthanda (which literally means ‘we love him’) Kolisi.
I certainly love you as Springbok captain – what an honour.
I’m not friends with Kolisi but I feel it’s safe enough to say that this surely will go down as one of his, if not the, biggest birthday gift he’s received despite it arriving prematurely, with the flank due to turn 27 on Youth Day.
This is an honour that should be celebrated in a perfect world, not only because he becomes the first black skipper for the Boks but because his selection was one made on merit.
Unfortunately, our country, South Africa, is not a perfect world.
Kolisi’s appointment was largely met with excitement and unsurprisingly, in some divisions, with a racial backlash.
As mentioned before, yours truly falls into the former category because to be quite frank, this appointment was long overdue.
Many of those dissatisfied with the appointment took to social media to voice their frustrations with the word ‘quota’ taking prevalence.
Excuse me? To my understanding, a quota player, in South African rugby anyway, is a black player who’s included in the Bok squad to make just enough numbers to ensure that the black minority who are interested in rugby, don’t complain about unfair racial representation.
Let’s take a second … Kolisi is captain of the Stormers and has 28 caps for the Boks under his belt already.
The three other captains who represent the country at Super Rugby are Bulls centre Burger Odendaal, whose name is absent in the Bok team. Ruan Botha has been skippering the Sharks but he too is nowhere on the Bok squad and in Johannesburg at the Lions, Franco Mostert has been the general in place of the injury-plagued Warren Whitely, who would’ve probably resumed his role of Bok skipper this season.
This is just on leadership.
Let’s look at the other wing forwards in coach Rassie Erasmus’ squad.
Kolisi’s teammate at the Stormers Nizaam Carr is in the mould of a blindside flank and is not a guaranteed starter in Cape Town.
The Sharks’ Jean-Luc du Preez has been impressive in the number seven jumper and looks like the front-runner to wear the number seven in the Green and Gold too. His brother Dan started at number eight at their most recent game against the Jaguars – and that happens to be the spot for one Duane Vermeulen – who would easily slot in almost any team in his position.
The Lions’ Kwagga Smith has deservedly earned his first Bok call-up but is unlikely to crack into the starting 15, at least not yet. The same reason applies to Sikhumbuzo Notshe of the Stormers.
Then there’s another ‘quota’ player in Oupa Mohoje of the Cheetahs, who has somehow managed to already notch-up 18 caps for the Green and Gold.
His team’s absence in Super Rugby might play against him, and Jean-Luc has made himself hard to ignore.
This leaves Kolisi all but uncontested for the Bok openside jersey. So much for a ‘quota’ player.
Never mind the unfortunate racial backlash that has met this humdinger, 24 years (since democracy) cannot make up for hundreds of years of racism before that, it’s the country’s unfortunate norm.
