Tony McKeever

In the last two weeks all of South Africa bore witness to two remarkable rugby events — that far from being incidental, as a consequence of the Soccer World Cup change in venue requirements — had a Super 14 rugby semifinal and final being played at Orlando Stadium in Soweto. These two events, each with […]

On average a game of 80 minutes of Super 14 rugby, has just 34 minutes of playing time. The rest of the 47 minutes is directly attributable to the referee and how he blows the game. The standard of refereeing this 2010 Super 14 competition has gone from bloody awful to absolutely flawless. However, no […]

International rugby is really squaring up to a North vs. South battle between the hemispheres, as to who gets to harvest the financial returns or not. The next five years will be particularly challenging for the Sanzar countries in spite of them occupying the top three slots of the International Rugby Board rankings, with little […]

We all love our game of rugby with varying degrees of passion, from the Taliban-like fundamentalism of the painted Bulls bone heads, to the plasma screen couch fans popping salted peanuts in their mouth at home or at bars around the world. The game either ranges from a spectacle with a clash of the titan […]

é On March 5, SA Rugby nominations for President, Deputy President and Vice President, must be received in writing, from both the nominees accepting the nomination, as well as those doing the nomination, for the SA Rugby elections that will take place on the March 26. It is really quite simple. SA Rugby’s 14 unions […]

You might ask what do the Springboks and Stuart Tinner have in common. If your answer is £250 000 (about R3.1 million) you would be right. Each received £250 000 for last night’s performance and some may argue that Tinner showed more talent. Tinner by the way is the chap, who in his socks, kicked a 30m punt […]

Congratulations to the Australian Rugby Union who against all odds have managed (read carefully and meticulously choreographed) to bring the 15th Super Rugby franchise to Melbourne, especially when ARU has 80 000 registered rugby players and SA Rugby more than 500 000, over 5 times the number of players in Australia. SA Rugby has had 4 years […]

Melbourne or Mandela Bay? The decision as to which franchise gets the 5th Australian-based and 15th Super Rugby franchise, will be announced on October 21 by Sanzar. This has not been a simple bid process in which prospective Super Rugby franchise teams simply respond to the criteria of the bid document (See it here1-sanzar-super-15-application.pdf) in […]

Rugby in the Southern Hemisphere, especially in the SANZAR countries is principally driven by the capital infusion from Newscorp who buy the broadcast rights from SANZAR for the Super Rugby Super 14 series, Tri Nations and British & Irish Lions Tours. These rights are then syndicated out to countries around the world so Newscorp recoups […]

It’s uncanny how South Africans can be so narcissistic, arrogant, stubborn and petulant to the extent that they become blind. It’s time for a little introspection and a massive overhaul of the way we conduct ourselves. Time and again we fail our people by being discourteous and rude with the most phenomenal gaffes on the […]

On Saturday a brawl involving about 100 students from two top rugby schools in New Zealand broke in front of the national rugby coach, Graham Henry. The fight, between players and supporters, lasted five minutes and led to at least one schoolboy being knocked out. The fight, trumpeted in the NZ Herald with the headline […]

Since June 8 2005 SA Rugby has carried the Eastern Cape Super Rugby franchise around its neck as a self-imposed albatross after declaring that SA had six Super Rugby franchises and this past week has seen a glaring display of dereliction of duty by SA Rugby’s Sanzar representatives. The 15th team, in an expanded Super […]