Currie Cup final this weekend!

So this weekend sees the final of the Currie Cup being played for by the Sharks and the Golden Lions. It is one of the oldest tournaments in rugby and steeped in tradition.

The Currie Cup trophy was donated by Sir Donald Currie in 1891 before the arrival of the touring British Isles team. Sir Donald Currie had this instruction to the team, hand this trophy over to the team in South Africa that gives you the best game and Griqualand West became the first ever holders of the Currie Cup. Griquas donated the trophy to the newly founded South African rugby board in 1892, and it henceforth became the trophy for the Currie Cup competition. Western Province became the first winners of the holy grail of South African rugby.

Sadly these days the Currie Cup does not quite hold the importance it once had since the advent of the super rugby tournament and the Tri Nations. In a modern era of professional rugby with the amount of rugby played these days the Currie Cup had to be compromised as a result.

The Currie Cup final was instituted for the first time in 1939 and there have been 50 finals to date.

One of the most influencial players in the history of the Currie Cup is Naas Botha, he played 179 matches for Northern Transvaal scoring 2511 points during his time with them. In the 15 seasons he played for Northern Transvaal in the Currie Cup, he represented them in 11 finals winning 9. Naas Botha was only 23 when south Africa was banned from international rugby and would have been a phenomenal star for South Africa had he been able to grace the hallowed rugby grounds of rugby Union. He only played 28 tests for South Africa and scored 312 points during that time.

The Currie Cup trophy will be the sharks attempting to defend the trophy they won last year, when Patrick Lambie made his mark by scoring two tries, three conversions and three penalties in Sharks' 30-10 win over Western Province.

The golden Lions who has been experiencing a resurgence under coach John Mitchell and back line coach Carlos Spencer will have home ground advantage after finishing top of the log for the season.

In a game of two halves the Sharks managed to beat a Cheetahs team after scoring all the the points in the second half.

The Lions never looked like losing in their semi final against the Western Province outscoring them 29-20 in front of a well packed stadium at Ellispark.

The tickets have been sold out for the final and promises to be a cracker of a game.


Some historical facts.

Number of Finals: 50

Number of Times in a Final
Blue Bulls: 31
Western Province: 23
Lions: 18
Natal: 13
Free State: 12
Boland: 1
Falcons: 1
Griqualand West: 1

Number of victories
Blue Bulls: 22 (including four draws)
Western Province: 12 (including two draws)
Lions: 8 (including a draw)
Natal: 5
Free State: 4 (including a draw)
Griqualand West: 1

excellant Biltong, If we get it over here I most definitely have a look .

we dont get to see enough of you're domestic rugby, and had therefore just presumed that the Sharks would do it easy,but it appears I was wrong on that....Enjoy.

Laurie, we are then more fortunate than you guys, we get all the ITM cup matches on Supersport. Well I am sure it is all of them, we even see your rugby show Re-Union every week.

Time you guys talk to your broadcasters?

Yes i've seen you mention that you get Reunion in the past,have a look this weeek at their version of the "Eye gouge" it is the best one, they were the only one to get the tape as Sky was the Broadcaster in Nz.

But back to Currie Cup,two Kiwi coaches I see, Plumtree has really found his home in Durban dont you reckon..

Plumtree has been great for the sharks for some time now, I am trying to remember how long he has been there.

I often wonder why people don't like Mitchell though, I have heard reports that he is a little autocratic in his approach, but then that works with our culture, that's why I would love him to be our Springbok coach, some new ideas and good discipline has never hurt a south African.

Unless of course you go to the extreme of Rudolf Streauli.

I would like the Lions to win this one for their coach, the Union has been down for some time and even financially they have had their problems, I must say I haven't seen as many people at Ellis Park that come to games now since Mitchell has achieved some success with his team.

The important thing to note is he has no stars in his team, the only big name players is Van Heerden who must be close to 50 by now.

Plumtree has been there for quite some time,he is ex Hurricanes and was a NZ sevens player, I think he went there when Kevin Putt was still there and married a SA lady.
I just checked what the Rugby channnel are giving us this weekend you wouldnt B....y believe it at the time of the C Cup they are giving usToulose V Stade (as if we havent had enough of Frenchmen this week) followed byGloucester v Saracens then Connaught v Blues (delayed).. Youre right thse guys need putting straight.

Well at least with the Saracens match you will be able to see a number of south Africans.

And the most underrated openside flanker in the World Cup.. How come you guys didnt poach him?

Should be a good game. Looking at those stats, the Bulls are a long way ahead of all the other teams arent they? Winning almost half of the competitions?

Out of interest, how recently was it that the nicknames for the teams became the only name for the teams? Just thinking of Natal>Natal Sharks>Sharks in particular but also Northern Transvaal into Lions etc.

Bathman it all happened during the pro era.

I guess Biltong wont be letting us have John Mitchell back for while.

Weren't there more teams back then too?

Dave in the isolation years the currie Cup was 6 premier teams which included the 5 current super rugby franchises and Eastern Province, which in those days were quite a strong team.

In 1996 SARU scrapped the Premier division and first division and put all 14 provinces in the premier competition.

I am not exactly sure when it went back to 8 teams, but if mymemory serves me the 14 team currie cup only lasted a few years and then ent back to 8.