Ken Borland

Considering the big money backing them up, the Sharks’ early form this season was shameful and led to their critics picking apart the franchise. And the consensus seemed to be that their pipeline was to blame, with insufficient depth to make up for the erratic availability and form of their many Springbok stars.

The once-vaunted Sharks Academy was a particular focal point and the franchise’s management have confirmed that revamping that feeder is a priority. Critics of the Academy say that it has become too focused on earning money – allowing lesser players to buy their way into the program – rather than being an impactful high performance set-up.

Director of Rugby Neil Powell has pointed to the success of the Sharks’ junior teams as evidence that their contracting and pipeline are perhaps not as bad as many have portrayed.

“Last season the U19s finished second in their competition, the U20s won their’s unbeaten and the U21s were beaten by one point in the semi-finals,” Powell said. “Which shows our rugby strategy revolves around having a sustainable and successful system, not just one team. We believe success in the foundation phases will filter through to the flagship team.

“We are also looking at a rebuild of our Academy. Coenraad de Villiers headed up the Western Province Academy and we want him to create a high-performance environment which is also a feeder into our system. We have two groups of U19 players here – those who are contracted and those who come to the commercial academy, which has not been a big feeder in the past few years. We’re on a journey to turn that around, which is why we’ve got Coenraad.

“We want to change the perception of the academy: we want a quality rugby program, but the teaching must also be holistic. We want to make sure ambitious kids come into the academy, the expectation is that they develop into good rugby players and hopefully kick on.

“In terms of recruitment, we follow a hybrid approach: We identify world-class talent to obtain but we also want to build through our junior structures. The thinking is that recruiting from the outside is more specific, it’s about certain positions. In a couple of years we hope to be recruiting more from our own systems than from outside.

“It’s crucial that the junior system understands what it takes to be professional, so we can make sure they can filter into the senior system. Players will also not leave if they have love for the Sharks, if they feel at home here. The plan is to bring players through from U21 to the Currie Cup, blood them there, and if they pass that test then they can move on to the United Rugby Championship,” Powell said.

Sharks chief executive Eduard Coetzee, who will vacate his position in July to take up a post in Europe with MVM Holdings, the franchise’s majority investors, has said, however, that they will continue to target high-profile signings as well. He says big-name signings are good for the brand and encourage further investment from commercial partners.

“The market perception is that we contract from the top down, but other teams do this too. The schoolboy pathway is unbelievably important for us too. We have 10 schools in KZN who play at the elite level and they have probably been over-aggressive in scouting for players. In terms of rugby scholarships, R75 million is spent annually by those schools. It’s not healthy, but it’s not just in KZN that it is happening.

“We have to build a programme in conjunction with what the schools are doing. We track players from U12 and we filter in the ones good enough to play professional rugby. From U15 they come through our system and junior structures and they become Sharks. It’s important to have numbers in our academy, while Neil Powell and John Plumtree focus on high performance, and there needs to be a synergy between those two. Just filling in numbers is not good enough for what we require. The academy was owned by third parties, but that has now all been bought back and we hope that it will be an environment that young kids want to be part of.

“Sometimes we do bring in someone with celebrity power, but our focus is definitely our pipeline, so hopefully that dispels that myth. We do have so many Springboks and that has led to long discussions at Board level. It’s wonderful for the Sharks to have World Cup winners walking around Kings Park. Pre-Covid, we had R60 million worth of sponsorship and in the last four years we have doubled that. I believe people and businesses see something different about us: I would say it’s the way we treat each other and the reach of our brand.

“But we are almost victims of our own success having so many Springboks, and there has been a shortfall in terms of our rugby. We are planning the whole make-up of our squad totally differently next season,” Coetzee said.

Former Springbok wing JP Pietersen is an integral part of that planning.

“Our focus points are our coaching structure – to have the right people in the right places; the recruitment and elevation of senior players; a long-term succession plan for our junior group; and the culture and environment of the Sharks,” Powell said. “We want consistency across our structures in terms of coaching and culture. If possible, we would like to fill all coaching vacancies from within the system. JP Pietersen is the head of our junior structures and is also very passionate about the Sharks. He came here as a 19-year-old and went on to play 70 Tests. This is his home.”

While a group of happy players is obviously a positive, some critics say the Sharks are all about the good vibes and culture but are lacking the hunger and grit that comes from hard work.

“The aim is to have a culture that is tough but enjoyable, and to ensure that all the players we recruit can fit into that culture. If we make things too easy, then there won’t be a high enough work ethic and the players will not get fulfilment. Healthy internal competition is how you get the best out of the players,” Powell said.

“Keep your feet on the ground and reach for the stars” was the catchphrase of famous American radio DJ Casey Kasem, also used by renown South African disc-jockey David Gresham, and although it comes from a time well before Casey Jarvis was born, it aptly describes what the rising star is doing on golf courses around the world at the moment.

Jarvis, who turned 20 in July, is currently firmly in the mix for the South African Open title at Blair Atholl Golf and Equestrian Estate and, at the end of a breakthrough year for one of the most decorated amateurs in local history it is his mature, measured approach that has caught the eye.

It was noticeable from the second round when the SA Open organisers began using devilishly tricky pin-placements and an inconsistent, shifting wind picked up, how adept Jarvis was at not taking on the ‘sucker-flags’ and finding the best places on the greens.

Jarvis has game, of that there can be no doubt given his stellar CV, but he also has the priceless attribute of a level head. It is that strong mentality that saw him notch his first overseas win as a professional in Austria in his last couple of weeks as a teenager, as part of his dominance of the Challenge Tour that led to him winning his DP World Tour card for the coming season.

The State Mines Country Club representative was in touching distance of the lead going into the 2022 Joburg Open at Houghton Golf Club, before fading on the weekend, but he says he is a different player to the one who left South Africa to take on Europe, and those changes were apparent as he soared up the leaderboard at Blair Atholl.

“Playing overseas is so difficult, the courses in Europe are so different to back home here in SA and you’ve got to really learn how to manage your game. I’ve learnt so much since last year’s Joburg Open,” Jarvis said.

“The Challenge Tour taught me not to be as aggressive. I learnt patience – I don’t need to hit it to five feet on every hole, which I used to want to, because my putting is good enough. I don’t need to attack all the flags, I don’t need to go for every par-five in two, I must just make sure I am straight off the tee-box.

“You’ve got to manage your game and I think I’m doing that really well this week. I can still be aggressive when I need to be and I’m happy that it all seems to be coming together,” Jarvis said.

Born in Boksburg on July 28, 2003, Casey David Jarvis has a biography that makes for riveting reading.

In 2020 he won both the South African Strokeplay Championship and the South African Amateur Championship before claiming the Freddie Tait Cup for the leading amateur at that year’s South African Open. It was a treble only achieved twice before, by the legendary Bobby Locke in 1935 and by Neville Clarke, who beat Ernie Els to those amateur crowns in 1989 but only turned pro in his senior years because he had a successful career as an electrical engineer.

If Jarvis now goes on to win the SA Open at Blair Atholl, he will join Locke, an eight-time champion who also won four British Open Championships, in rarefied air.

Jarvis’s amateur career also included winning the Junior World Cup with the South African team in 2019 as well as the African Amateur Championship back-to-back in 2021 and 2022. In 2020 he was named the America-based AmateurGolf.com Men’s Player of the Year despite not playing College golf.

Jarvis was last season’s Sunshine Tour Rookie of the Year following a season in which he also became the second-youngest golfer globally to shoot a 59 on a major tour, which he achieved at the prestigious Players Championship at Dainfern.

For such a seasoned winner, triumphing on the Challenge Tour did not come easy for Jarvis, but he showed his character with his win in Austria because it came after back-to-back runners-up finishes just a month earlier in the Czech Republic and Copenhagen.

But there is a cautionary tale in flesh at Blair Atholl of young superstars burning themselves out, in Matteo Manassero, also strongly contending for the title. The Italian won three times on the European Tour as a teenager before losing his card in 2019. Now aged 30, he is back on the DP World Tour.

“There are many things that led to my struggles, but one of the most important is that I definitely became focused on results and forgot about the process and what worked for me,” Manassero told Rapport.

“Once you start going down that spiral of needing results week after week, it gets in your head and you neither improve your game nor your results. If your game is good enough week in, week out, then your results will come.

“But expectations can mean you are only focused on results and it is easy to fall into that trap. ‘Am I improving?’ should be your only focus, not making cuts, not keeping your card, not being top-50 in the world. Those are important goals but they are not the most important thing,” Manassero warned.

Fortunately, even though Jarvis admitted the Austrian win did buck him up after the two close misses, he said winning the SA Open on Sunday will not be his be-all and end-all.

“I’m just going to stick to what I’m doing, my golf feels good and I’m very comfortable and relaxed on the course, like a social round. I will just try to stay patient.

“It’s a big mental thing. I forced it for those second-place finishes, I really wanted to win and I just put more pressure on myself when there’s already enough pressure on you.

“I took a step back in Austria and just tried to go out and see what happened. I’ve learnt not to put so much pressure on myself because then I don’t play the way I want to. After finishing second so many times, to get it done was a good feeling. But I really did not expect to be doing these things when I was still so young.

“If I don’t win the SA Open, I would have learnt a lot,” Jarvis said.

The South African men’s hockey team will go into their African Hockey Olympic Qualifier in Pretoria from Sunday with a few injury withdrawals but a full complement of their available stars playing for European franchises.

The winners of the eight-team men’s competition, which concludes with the final on Sunday, November 5, will qualify directly for the Paris Olympics next July, so the stakes are high and SA coach Cheslyn Gie is delighted with the squad he has.

“Unfortunately we’ve had a few injuries, but it is still a very good squad and our training camp has gone very well,” Gie said at the University of Pretoria, where the tournament will be held, on Thursday.

“Clayton Saker, Le-Neal Jackson and Connor Beauchamp, who is one of our drag-flickers, are all out with knee injuries. Unfortunately that’s three defenders ruled out, and Chad Futcher and goalkeeper Siya Nolutshungu have both just started new jobs and cannot get leave, our team being an amateur one.

“But everyone else is good to go and our European-based players are in the midst of their season. They’ve all played four-to-six matches and they are looking really sharp, despite having to travel long distances to get here.

“This is a very important tournament for us, it always is, and I’ve never experienced any easy matches in it. It’s a bit of a worry that we haven’t played a Test since the World Cup at the beginning of the year and we will need to adjust quickly to the pace of international hockey and it’s something we’ve tried to simulate in our training camp,” Gie said.

Speaking of drag-flickers, Gie said he was concerned about Nigeria’s arsenal of these penalty corner goal-scoring specialists, but he also warned about the challenge perennial finalists Egypt, Kenya and Ghana will pose, even though South Africa have won every one of these qualifying tournaments. Fortunately those last three teams are all in the other pool, with Namibia, while the hosts will take on Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Uganda and should comfortably finish in the top two of their section, thereby qualifying for the semi-finals.

“Egypt are definitely going to be strong contenders, but Nigeria have three very good drag-flickers and Ghana are always strong. They actually led against Egypt in the semi-finals of the last qualifier, but missed some tap-in goals. Kenya are also very physical and strong, and they’ve been together for a while with their whole U21 squad coming through.

“You can’t underestimate how quickly things change in this tournament. There’s a lot of ebb and flow in the games too, and we have to make sure that when things are going well for us, we score the goals, and when things are not going well, we keep the opposition out,” Gie said.

South Africa’s women’s team have also won all four of the previous qualifying tournaments, but experienced star Celia Seerane said although their preparation has been outstanding, thoughts of just pitching up and cleaning up the opposition are far-fetched.

“It’s probably the best prepared we’ve ever been for the Africa Cup, we are ready and focused and enjoying the comforts of playing at home, but we can’t take anything for granted.

“History tells us that Ghana are going to be tough opponents and I remember when we went 1-0 down to them in a final in Kenya,” Seerane said.

Assistant coach Inky Zondi had a similar warning.

“All the teams have their unique style, which makes it very exciting. Nigeria will be very physical, they play quite an exciting brand of hockey and they have the combinations to do well in small spaces. Ghana are always a force, as are Kenya,” Zondi said.

South Africa play Nigeria and Zimbabwe in their pool, while Ghana, Kenya, Namibia and Zambia are in the other group in the seven-team women’s competition.

South Africa’s men open their campaign against Zimbabwe at 6pm on Sunday, while the women play the same country, at 4pm.

The Mumbai Indians Cape Town were the first team to announce their five pre-auction signings for South Africa’s new T20 league early next year, and they are all proper stars of the shortest format, led by two of the best bowlers in the business – Rashid Khan and Kagiso Rabada.

According to the rules of the still-unnamed tournament, each of the six franchises must make five direct signings before the auction, to comprise three foreign players, one player capped by South Africa and one uncapped.

MI Cape Town, which is owned by Reliance Industries, clearly pulled out all the stops in securing the services of spinner Rashid, pace spearhead Rabada, exciting new talent Dewald Brevis, and a pair of Englishmen in all-rounder Sam Curran and the explosive Liam Livingstone.

The 23-year-old Rashid, from Afghanistan, is wanted by all the T20 leagues around the world because of the many individual matchwinning performances he has produced in T20 as well as his effervescent personality. A canny leg-spinner who bowls at a brisk pace, a useful contributor with the bat down the order and a fine fielder, his signing for the South African league is a major coup.

While Rabada is one of the most feared fast bowlers in the game, the 19-year-old Brevis was all the rage in South Africa at the start of the year when he broke the record for the most runs in the U19 World Cup, playing some amazing innings. He then represented Mumbai Indians in the IPL, and clearly made an impression.

The MI Cape Town statement on Thursday confirmed that they will play in the same blue-and-gold colours of the Mumbai Indians, who have won the IPL five times since 2013.

Akash Ambani, the chairman of Reliance Industries, said, “I’m excited as we begin our journey in building MI Cape Town. With our direct player signings, we have taken the first step towards building the MI philosophy – having a strong core around which the team will be planned.

“I am glad to welcome Rashid, Kagiso, Liam, Sam, to the #OneFamily, and happy to have Dewald continue with us on this new journey.

“We are certain that MI Cape Town, like our two other teams, will play the brand of cricket Mumbai Indians is synonymous with – playing fearless cricket, and the same will resonate with the passionate cricket fans of South Africa and across the world.”

The first five players confirmed for South Africa’s new T20 league will certainly add the sort of value Commissioner Graeme Smith is striving to include in the line-ups.