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All schoolboy and amateur rugby are set to be banned until June 2021 according to informed sources according to the Afrikaans Sunday paper Die Rapport.
Currently, amateur sport is allowed to be participated in until 15 January 2021. However, according to the sources of Rapport, an announcement will be made during the coming week that will ban amateur rugby until June 2021. The major reason behind the decision is apparently the cost of Covid19 test to comply with current Covid19 regulations which will be too expensive for schools and clubs.
If the article is true it will be a sad day for rugby, especially schoolboy rugby. Little or nothing is known about the talented players apart from a few boys that were part of SARU's junior squads, that is in any event not a true reflection of the available talent. This will make contracting by unions and other institutions extremely difficult and unfair as the majority of players will be unknown to that rugby community.
Apart from all the Easter Festivals that will be cancelled, the yearly youth weeks which is set to be played during the June/July holiday could also be cancelled as there will be not enough time to play trials, and prepare before 25 June 2021, the date set for the tournaments to kick off. Expect the majority of the youth weeks to be cancelled for the year, with only the u/16 Grant Khomo and u/18 Craven Week to be played.
We could see the schoolboy rugby calendar that normally ends end of August running into late September early October but we are likely to experience yet another schoolboy rugby season severely disrupted by Covid19.