The Golden Lions, Blue Bulls and Western Province were among the biggest winners on the opening day of the annual FNB U16 Grant Khomo Week staged at Kearsney College near Durban on Monday.
The opening day of the U16 tournament served up a number of entertaining and high-scoring contests, with the Lions, Sharks XV, Pumas, Border, the Blue Bulls, Western Province, the Leopards, Free State, Iqhawe, the Limpopo Blue Bulls, and the Blue Bulls XV securing victories.
Results
Sharks XV 50-10 Zimbabwe
Sharks 17-20 Golden Lions,
The Lions dominated the first 10 minutes, and following several failed attempts, de Matteis scored a brilliant try, beating several Sharks defenders to lead 05-00. The Sharks converted a penalty to cut the Lions’ lead to 05-03 with 10 minutes left to play in the first half. With time running out, the Lions launched wave after wave of attacks and Jonker cut the defence of the Sharks to score under the poles, extending the Lions’ lead to 12-03, going into the second half.
Jonker yet again dashed down the touchline and scored a brilliant try, his second of the day, extending the Lions’ lead to 17-3 after 10 minutes played in the second half. Four minutes later, Jonker added a converted penalty. The Sharks clawed their way back into the match, and great interplay led to Mtetwa crashing over for the Sharks’ first try to cut the Lions' lead to 20-10 and 6 minutes still to play in the second half. The Sharks continued their onslaught, and 2 minutes later Alexander scored a try, cutting the Lions' lead to 20-17. The time ran out for the Sharks, and the Lions secured a well-deserved 20-17 win.
Boland 29-32 Pumas, B Field
Blue Bulls 56-15 Eastern Province.
The Bulls opened their scoring with a converted penalty after 5 minutes of play. Eastern Province converted a penalty to level the scores four minutes later. Bulls captain Badenhorst-Schnetler scored three tries, all off the back of lineout mauls, in quick succession to extend the Bulls' lead to 20-03, which was also the halftime score.
The Bulls continued where they left off, and Bekker crashed past several defenders to open the scoring in the second half, extending the Bulls' lead to 25-03 after 2 minutes of play in the second half. Thereafter, Olivier, Strauss, du Plooy and Bekker added their names to the try scorers sheet to extend the Bulls' lead to 51-03. With 10 minutes to play, great work by Muller led to a great try by Mano to cut the Bulls’ lead to 51-08. Two minutes later, Muller crashed over for Eastern Province’s 3rd try. Strauss scored a brilliant individual try to secure the Bulls a 56-15 win.
Border 62-10 Namibia, B Field
Western Province 73-14 Griffons
A brilliant try by Linnen within a minute of play in the first half following great handling by the backline of Western Province. However, the Griffons clawed their way back in contention and took a 07-05 lead with the try by Kannemeyer after 8 minutes of play in the first half. The Western Province set up camp in the Griffons 22m and eventually Stoffels crashed over the tryline, extending Western Province’s lead to 10-07 after 16 minutes of play. An aimless kick up the field from the Griffons allowed the Western Province to attack from deep, and van Wyk scored a swan-dive try, extending Western Province’s lead to 17-07. Thereafter, JP Immelman and Pietersen scored a try each to extend Western Province’s lead to 29-07 at the halftime break.
Western Province continued their onslaught in the second half, and tries by Kabamba (2), JP Immelman (2), and Pietersen extended Western Province’s lead to 54-07 and 14 minutes to play. An intercept try by the Griffons' Khubheka had the crowd on their feet; however, JP Immelman (2) and Davids scored tries for Western Province during the final 10 minutes to secure a 73-14 win.
Leopards 27-26 Valke, B Field
South Western Districts 32-50 Free State
The number of Grey College boys in the Free State squad gave them the attacking edge against SWD, which was mainly made up of Oakdale and Outeniqua. Free State
SWD converted an early penalty to lead 03-00 after just 3 minutes of play in the first half, to which the Free State replied two minutes later. SWD attacked from the kickoff, and Westraad ran a great line to score the first try for SWD to lead 08-03 after 8 minutes of play. The Free State replied immediately when Qamba sniped from behind a ruck to score a great individual try to take the lead for the first time in the match, 10-08. Williams added another try for the Free State with brilliant running to extend the Free State’s lead to 17-08 after 15 minutes of play in the first half. Botha was SWD’s almost immediate reply, whereafter they added a second converted penalty to retake the lead 18-17 with 8 minutes to play in the first half. SWD scored two late tries by Hendricks and Botha to extend SWD’s lead to 32-17 going into the second half.
Free Started like a house on fire and scored a great try by von Willing within two minutes of the start of the second half. The Free State used dominance and scored tries by Mdunge, Els and Fourie to retake the lead 43-32 with five minutes to play. Free State captain Els ended the try-fest with an 80-plus meter run to score his second try, securing the Free State a 50-32 win.
Iqhawe 69-08 Border Country Districts, B Field
Griquas 14-15 Limpopo Blue Bulls
Both teams show their willingness to spread the ball wide whenever they can, while using their big forwards upfront to secure great attacking ball for their backs.
The Limpopo Bulls struck from their own half. Following a great run by the Bulls’ Olyn, who toed the ball into the Griquas’ ingoal area, and Faye scored the Limpopo Bulls' first try of the match, leading 05-00 after 13 minutes of play in the first half. Steyn converted a penalty to extend the Bulls' lead to 08-00. Griquas struck back after 30 minutes of play when White scored a great cut the Bulls' lead to 08-07 going into the second half.
Griquas started to dominate in the second half, and following 15 minutes of action, flanker Pakalitha scored their second try to take the lead 14-08 for the first time in the match. However, the Bulls struck back immediately when flanker Meyer crashed over to retake the lead 15-14.
Blue Bulls XV 107-00 Kenya, B Field