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Monday's Varsity Cup Days!! Back your Boytjies!!

TRF_heineken

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This thread is dedicated to the Varisty Cup tournament which started yesterday in full swing. Let's talk about the games, the players, the new point system, anything varsity cup related, hell, we can even talk about those damn ugly pink shorts!!

Yesterday's results had me a bit surprised and disappointed in the same breath... as a UJ supporter (family reasons) They had a really poor result vs TUKS who smashed them hard. the Surprise of the day for me was Shimlas beating Ikeys quite convincingly, I had to see it has been a long time coming and hopefully shimlas can keep up the pace they set with many Grey Kollege guys in their system.

So guys, fire away!
 
I was a tad sad to see Ikeys (alma mater) got beat badly but as I like both Shimlas and Maties as well I'm not too beat up about it. As long as the cup remains in the Cape I'm happy.

Not too surprised to see Ikeys do badly what with all their bloody players in the extended Stormers squad. Pretty surprised to see THAT scorelin in the Maties game; look like they may be upset about relinquishing the ***le last year and are back to make things right.

I could not watch a game yesterday but managed to see the a few 1st div games last week and I have to say I was pretty impressed with the level of refereeing at this level (better at times than S15!!). We should have only SA refs in Super rugby but I guess that'd be as much of a hinderance to SA teams as having NZ and Aus 'refs'.

The other thing that stood out was the trial points (5 for a try, 3 for a conversion and 2 for a penalty and drop) and I have to say I hate it unresevedly. WTF! You'll have to score 4 penalties to equal a try and while in the varsity cup the discipline has been pretty good it just opens up a can of worms where better teams will be smarter about infringes and with better defences they will just look to slow down the ball with giving away a penalty meaning nothing at all. It also takes away from the conversion in a way IMO in that 2 penalties (6) used to be more than an unconverted try (5) but less than a converted try (7) which makes for interesting games IMO.

IMO the only thing that they needed to do to sort out the game and get entertaining rugby (I'm assuming that's what they are doing with rewarding the team scoring tries) is be more strict at the breakdown like they were in 2010. FFS it worked and then they started not to enforce it anymore. Just enforce the bloody existing laws. The only other thing is the scrum (refs need some education here) and consistency in reffing these areas and consistency in citings/disciplinary proceedings.
 
I agree wholeheartedly about the points system! this is now one thing that should have kept just as it were! And it just looks weird!
 
I agree wholeheartedly about the points system! this is now one thing that should have kept just as it were! And it just looks weird!

Another change to satisfy the Aussies. Who are they bribing? LOL
 
I agree regarding the points systems.

I was quite impress by Tuks especially Blommetjies and Lohan Jacobs. I just hoped that Ludeke also watch the game and give Blommetjies a call-up. He is miles better than Kirchner.

I was hoping to see Moaner van Heerden youngest son playing. I've heard that he is a real "chip of the old block" and even better than his dad. Apparently a great future is expected of him.

there was a lot of handling errors in both games, but that is probably expected in the first game of the season.

The referee in the Shimla/ Ikey game had a shocker and the penealty count in the UP/UJ game was also sky high.
 
So the top 4 has been the best in the Tournament and last night's matches brought out some interesting outcomes.

Tuks finished 1st on the log after smashing Pukke
UJ and Maties drew 10-10

Maties ended 2nd on log, but were unbeaten the whole tournament and Tuks finished 1st, but with 1 loss.

next week is semi-finals and it will be a Replay of yesterday's matches, only on different venue's.
 
Sad to see UCT out of it already; as ***le holders it would've added a bit of spice to the proceedings but they weren't up for it I suppose and our best players being upgraded to the WP/Stormers squads certainly didn't help our cause.

I'll be hoping for Maties to keep it in the Cape. The game vs UJ is going to be huge. I have to say I'm a little surprised that Tuks finished top of the log; I was certain of a Maties home final. Guess they have to be clear favorites now though as Maties vs UJ is going to be a tough encounter and then the winner will have to travel and face Tuks at home (who should easily overcome Pukke).

O, dis lente.. in die Boland...
 

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