Currie Cup champions, the Cheetahs, deserve better than four Force matches

Spare a thought for the Cheetahs.

While the rest of the rugby world are getting excited about the World Cup that kicks off on September 8 in France, the Cheetahs (and their fans) have to get excited about playing in an invitational competition, the Toyota Challenge, against the Western Force from Australia – in four matches.

The first of these matches takes place in Bloemfontein on Friday evening (5pm) with the second next Saturday, also in Bloemfontein.

Then there’s a four-week break before the teams meet again, on back-to-back weekends at the end of September and early October, but this time in Perth.

Timing

The timing of the matches is strange because they’re scheduled in the middle of nowhere. The Cheetahs’ next proper assignment is in the European Challenge Cup, but that only starts in mid-December, so the Toyota Challenge matches can hardly be considered warm-up games.

Importantly though the matches have a R250,000 prize up for grabs for the winners, so if the Cheetahs were to win all four they’d bag a cool million bucks … and that would go a long to keeping some players happy, and paying some bills.

But, again, one’s got to wonder what the point is of playing the Western Force in four matches? Sure, the Cheetahs players earn salaries and it is their job to play rugby, wherever that might be and against whoever, but this surely cannot be the future for these men?

Currie Cup champions

The Challenge Cup is at least something to look forward to for the players, and the fact the Cheetahs will be based in Amsterdam for their home matches, but a season-long competition, against top-class opposition, must still be the goal.

Let’s not forget the Cheetahs are South Africa’s champion team, having won the Currie Cup last season.

And, while the men from Bloemfontein might not have played against the strongest Bulls, Sharks, Lions and WP teams all the time, their triumph was a big win and again showed they deserve better.

It will be interesting to see how the fans embrace the Toyota Challenge, if they even know about it? Is it something that they’re excited about and are looking forward to or, because the matches are really only friendlies, is it something they couldn’t give two hoots about? I suspect it’s the latter.