Two mistakes cost Toti the Murray Cup

AMANZIMTOTI Rugby Club’s first team entered the Murray Cup final on Saturday, 13 August as the underdogs because Durban Collegians were branded as firm favourites following their two previous wins leading up to the final and victories over Toti in the season.

Toti kicked off the scoring in the first half with Jaco de Jaeger converting an early penalty.

A while later Collegians responded with a penalty of their own by Duncan Campbell. The score line remained at 3–3 going into the half. It is hard to describe how the Toti boys manned up to their more experienced counterparts, where punch-for-punch was exchanged with neither side giving ground. However, Toti was certainly looking the better of the two sides in the exchanges.

The second half saw Le Roux van Zyl slot a penalty to take the score to 6–3. It was then Toti’s John Wilsnach who scored the first try of the match which was converted by Van Zyl, taking the lead to 13–6. Toti then went into attack mode and were dominating the Collegians forwards, but could not put points on the board.

With about 15 minutes left in the game, Collegians took advantage of a silly mistake by Toti in the in-goal area that led to a try by Francois Kleynhans which was converted by Campbell to bring the scores level at 13-13. Shortly thereafter a missed penalty kick by Toti that struck the uprights was nearly gathered on the line by Thinus Volker, which would have in all probability sealed the game for Toti. Toti then had a second bite at the cherry when they were awarded a penalty that was pulled left of the uprights by Van Zyl. The match ended with the scores level at 13–13, which meant extra time.

This was not ideal for the Toti boys, who had given everything in the 80 minutes of play. Collegians with their depth in numbers and fresh bench meant that Toti would need to dig very deep. Within minutes of extra time, the Collegians ran in three unanswered tries that sealed Toti’s fate.

The Toti players were not only bruised and battered from the encounter but their hearts were also broken in that they were two mistakes away from winning the trophy for a second time in three years. It would be safe to say that SA Home Loans Durban Collegians could not have expected the fight that they experienced from the Toti boys.

Toti’s Le Roux van Zyl was awarded the Castle man of the match award and Kevin Buck was awarded Castle’s most valuable player award and the player who scored the most tries (eight) in the tournament.

Amanzimtoti Rugby Club thanks its sponsors who have made the 2016 season possible and requests that the friends of rugby and the community support these sponsors, whose names appear on the club house walls. The club thanks its supporters for making the trip through to Durban North and for all their support in 2016. The club will certainly try again in 2017 to win both the Fidelity Premier Division and Castle Murray Cup for Amanzimtoti.

In closing, it was a huge season for Toti with the third team winning the Foaden Bowl, firsts ending third in the league, which was one place better than last year and the second team ending third in the league, which was a huge improvement on their second last position the year before. The club looks forward to welcoming a confirmed development team in 2017 and hopefully also an U20 team, if it receives the support of local youngsters.

The club wishes best of luck to head coach, Kevin van Rensburg, assistant coach, Jeff Harper and players who will be part of the Sharks Club 15 and DRSU Lions teams.