Few teams look like rugby superheroes in the making

I am quite convinced that many a South African household gave a collective sigh of relief with the local rugby season and the Six Nations kicking off this weekend.

Chris van Zyl of the Stormers during the during the Super Rugby, #SuperHeroSunday match between DHL Stormers and Vodacom Bulls at Cape Town Stadium on February 03, 2019 in Cape Town, South Africa. (Photo by Carl Fourie/Gallo Images)

The off-season was so long, a lot of us were beginning to experience withdrawal symptoms. The anticipation of the new season has been building up for weeks, and I was looking forward to it very much like I do for that first beer on a Saturday after all the household chores have been done to the satisfaction of the trouser-wearing one in the house.

But oi! Most of this past weekend’s rugby action was like a warm beer. The only team that really looked like superheroes in the making was England.

On the local front, the powers that be deserve credit for the Super Rugby Superhero Sunday initiative. They did everything right. Great venue and two mouth-watering clashes. Pity all the superheroes didn’t pitch up.

The Bulls predictably did their Powerpuff stuff. I’m most certainly not going to call Bulls captain Lood de Jager “Buttercup” to his face. But if he and the boys from Pretoria want silverware in their very, very empty display cabinet, they need less huffing and puffing and more blowing other teams away.

As for the Stormers, a word of advice: if you choose Pinky and the Brain as your go-to Superhero, don’t pick 15 Pinkys. Somebody must take responsibility for planning what to do when you have the ball.

It’s all good and well exploiting your opponents’ mistakes, but if they don’t make any, you’ll need the brain too. Watching the Sharks is like watching Nemo. Not only do we all know where to find him, we even know the words to the songs.

Very much like the post-match interview. “We learnt a lot blah blah blah proud of the family, I mean boys blah blah blah.” Stop dishing up Nemo. Give us Jaws!

Now, as a proud Lions supporter, I think it was just a simple misunderstanding. Something may have gotten lost in translation, because somehow, I suspect, they got confused between Spider-Man and Itsy-Bitsy spider. Guys, you were supposed to be the former.

Hopefully things will get better, but hey, a warm beer is better than no beer at all. Cheers!