Super 14 Rugby

Super 14 Rugby, for those of you who don't know, is a competition between 14 rugby teams from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. It's one of my favourite rugby tournaments to watch each year (that and the Currie Cup, a competition between South African regional teams). This year the Super 14 final was between two South African teams, the Stormers (from Cape Town) and the Blue Bulls (from Pretoria).

Since we live in Pretoria you'd think we're Blue Bulls fans, but if you've ever seen a Blue Bulls fan, well... they're a little crazier than the normal rugby fan. Yesterday, for instance, if you had driven around Pretoria, you would have seen a sea of people wearing blue. You would have seen bakkies with huge Blue Bulls flags flying behind them, bakkies with giant bull horns coming out of the cab, and bakkies with blue... um... balls hanging from the trailer hitches. You would have seen people wearing blue wigs, people wearing no shirts with huge bellies painted blue, and of course, people braai-ing all day long. A rugby final in which the Bulls are playing is very nearly a national holiday for those who stay in Pretoria.

For the record, we're Sharks fans (the Sharks play in Durban). Dan decided to wear his Sharks jersey yesterday. Bad idea. Bad, bad idea. I played it safe and wore my Springboks shirt, always acceptable no matter which city you live in.

The game was awesome. I love rugby. It moves so fast, and there are no commercial breaks during the game, so you get to watch 40 minutes of uninterrupted rugby, then a few adverts, then 40 more minutes. I love blood substitutions. I love how tough the guys are. I love the excitement. I love watching Morné Steyn kick. I love watching Bryan Habana run. I love watching Victor Matfield's leadership and Schalk Burger tackling someone. Awesome. Just awesome. I am a definite convert to the game of rugby.