2023 Grey High Festival Review

The hosts scrape two wins as upsets are the order of the day

Photo credit: SA School Sports (Twitter)

The Grey High Festival, falling as it did in clashing with the ABSA Wildeklawer Festival, was always going to play second fiddle to the event in Kimberley. Nevertheless, there were a number of exciting games to keep the healthy crowds entertained across all the fields at Grey High as both junior and First XVs took part over the long weekend in PE. The weather was clear, but the ubiquitous wind that bedevils the Kolisi Field made for treacherous kicking conditions as teams struggled to exit into the south-wester.

As schools up and down the country can now focus on traditional derby days for the rest of the season (outside of the provincial weeks), it was interesting to see the junior sides and where the power bases lie.

The Grey High u14 and 15a sides were very unlucky to lose to Paul Roos a couple of weeks back, owing to some rather dubious refereeing at the end of both games and went into the week the strongest side in their age group. So it proved as both sides won both their games, although the u14s were fortunate to beat a determined SACS side 7 - 5 on the opening day. The Grey u15s are their flagship side, as they were last year, and scored comfortable wins over SACS and KES to justify their top 10 ranking.

In the u16 division, the SACS side won both their games over Eastern Cape opposition, beating the hosts and Queen’s as they look forward to the tough WP league fixtures for the rest of the Second Term. This is a determined side who should claim a number of high profile scalps before the end of the season. A big surprise for me was the performance of the Saints u16 side. They beat St Andrew’s College and drew to Grey High, a most encouraging set of results, although this Grey u16 side must already be looking forward to the end of the season, such has been their fate thus far.

Day 1 - Thursday 27 April 2023

Pretoria Boys’ High, ravaged by injury in recent weeks to their captain and vice captain, had requested a ‘padded’ fixture first up and were made to work hard for their win over plucky PE side Ithembelihle. The Candies won 15 - 5 and would have been happy to get through the game unscathed and without adding to their injury list.

Selborne’s struggles this season have been well documented, but they clicked into gear in the second half of their clash against Brandwag, another side who have had a season to forget thus far. Leading 5 - 0 at half-time and playing into the wind in the second half, Selborne scored 5 tries without reply to claim a convincing 32 - 0 win and establish some much-needed confidence for their second game against the dangerous Jeppe side.

Westville overcame the little-known Vootrekker Bethlehem by 28 - 5, their size and skill advantage leading to a comfortable win. The side from Durban have had a good season thus far and they are an imposing proposition for any team. Their massive pack is supplemented by a strong and fast backline who can and do score tries from anywhere.

Graeme College were immense against the much-vaunted KES side, keeping them at bay until the 54th minute when KES finally scored to break the deadlock. The dogged Graemian defence and wind proving difficult for the side from Houghton to overcome. Two tries in the closing stages gave KES their 12 - 0 victory, but on another day the result could have been different as Graeme also had their moments of pressure in the KES 22m.

In the main curtain-raiser, Jeppe produced the performance of the weekend in trouncing a confident, if much smaller Queen’s side. Jeppe scored some brilliant tries and their centre and captain Exauce Kevani was instrumental in the win. Jeppe were too strong for Queen’s and dominated the collisions and made numerous linebreaks on their way to scoring eight tries to one in a huge 51 - 5 win.

In the final game of the day, the hosts played SACS in a game full of twists and turns, and full of niggle in front of a large crowd on the Kolisi Field. Grey scored first, unsurprisingly the try coming through a dominant forward effort, but SACS were to be no pushovers on the day. They reduced the deficit to 5 - 3 from the boot of flyhalf Rayaan Solomons, before stunning the home crowd on half time by scoring a brilliant try in the corner which was converted to give them a shock 10 - 5 half-time lead. Grey had it all to do in the second half, into a strong breeze. Grey relied on their potent lineout maul to drag them back into the game in the second half and restored their lead going into the final quarter at 15 - 10. Then Grey shot themselves in the foot through some sloppy play in the backline, gifting a try to hardworking SACS flank Ben van Coller as SACS regained the lead 17 - 15 with a little over ten minutes to play. The home side produced a stirring late fightback to score two tries late on through their dominant lineout maul (one of which made as much as 40m on the hoof) to win 27 - 17 to the relief of players and supporters alike.

Day 2 - Saturday 29 April 2023

Jeppe and Selborne played out a thrilling 34-all draw in the early kick off of the second day’s action. The game was made even more exciting by the fact that the electronic scoreboard seemed to have a mind of its own, constantly changing when points were scored with the updates being incorrect. Even several minutes after the game some puzzled Old Selbornians were enquiring as to the correct end result. Jeppe raced to a 12 - 0 lead after two well-taken tries and after five minutes it looked like another huge Jeppe win was on the cards. This poor start galvanised the Selborne side who came storming back, scoring three tries to lead 17 - 12 at half-time, the turnaround led by No. 8 Dewan du Preez and strong midfield defence. Jeppe scored first in the second half through a lineout maul to level the scores at 17-all but Selborne then extended their lead through two forward orientated tries and looked set for victory at 31 - 17 with 15 minutes to go. Jeppe then again reduced the deficit, with their excellent scrumhalf Bryce Samuel prominent in the build up to make it 31 - 24. Selborne, desperate for the win, added three points from the tee to gain what seemed surely now to be an unassailable lead of 34 - 24 with just two minutes left. Jeppe then came back firing and produced a stunning 90 seconds of rugby, first through power from their forwards leading to a Samuel try, and then from the final restart, an astonishing run on the right wing by Tshabalala who ran through countless Selborne defenders to run 60m to score in the corner. Jeppe missed the match-winning conversion but were given a retake as Selborne were deemed to have advanced early. Into the wind and from the corner was always going to be a hard ask and when the kick sailed wide the sides had to settle for a brilliant 34-all draw, much to the dismay of my sister’s father-in-law, a proud Old Selbornian who was seated next to me.

Graeme then beat Voortrekker Bethlehem comfortably by 32 - 12, as they finished their preparations for their massive clash this weekend against bitter rivals St Andrew’s in Grahamstown. Graeme again acquitting themselves well as they had done at St John’s over Easter, their towering flank Batho Hlekani proving difficult to stop all weekend.

In a big surprise on the Pollock Field at lunchtime, the unpredictable and dangerous Dale side went down 5 - 22 to Nico Malan from Humansdorp. Dale would have fancied themselves against the Nico side but were not able to get their game going in one of a few shocks on the final day.

Pretoria Boys’ High ended the weekend with a good win over SACS, who had a tough assignment in backing up their determined display against Grey two days before with another testing examination against a Boys’ High side who had a far easier fixture on Day 1. For Pretoria Boys’, their hooker Shaun Schurmann was a constant menace with ball in hand and dominated in his collisions and the men from up north controlled large parts of the second half to record a 24 - 13 win.

In the penultimate game of the festival, Queen’s College produced the shock of the weekend when they beat KES 21 - 19. This result was made all the more surprising given the capitulation by Queen’s against Jeppe on Day 1. Queen’s led 14 - 12 at the break, with both sides scoring a solitary try in the second half. The difference between the sides being off the tee as Queen’s nailed all their conversions in tough kicking conditions. The match ended somewhat controversially with KES on the attack after the hooter as the Queen’s scrumhalf cynically dived across the passing lane from a scrum in what could have been ruled as a deliberate knockdown, but the referee ruled that this was just a knock on and therefore blew the final whistle to cue jubilant scenes amongst the Queen’s players as they rushed to celebrate with their coaches.

In the final game of the Festival, Grey again had to produce a late comeback to win against a very strong Westville side who were extremely unlucky to end up on the losing side. I was struck by how big this Westville side is, with the pack being somewhere in the region of 850kg, according to various sources. Their backline are no shrinking violets and will surely be well represented at the Craven Week in July. Westville’s centres, Finka and Ndlozi were particularly powerful on attack and defence. Ndlozi scoring the try of the weekend from his own half, showing why he has signed for the Blitzboks from 2024. Westville dominated the collisions all game and made plenty post contact metres in the carry, often needing to be stopped by multiple Grey defenders. Grey were trailing 10 - 15 after the hooter but their lineout maul had proved almost unstoppable and when the Westville loosehead was shown a yellow card for a side entry stopping a Grey maul, the home side sensed blood. From a well constructed maul which was heading for the line, the hosts were awarded a fortuitous penalty try, giving them the 17 - 15 win after the hooter to leave the many supporters and schoolboys on hand to delight in a hard-fought win.