My cherish affair with rugby began in 1995 when I was six. Twenty years later,the lack of black players in the squad has left me in dismayI was six years old when I huddled around a TV set with my parents and all their friends in Phakamisa township and watched Springbok flee half Joel Stransky score a glorious drop goal to win the 1995 Rugby World Cup for South Africa. We couldnt stop screaming. You could see the elation on every face in the room when Nelson Mandela, newly elected as president, and handed the trophy to Springbok captain Francois Pienaar. It was the first time that rugby,a traditionally divisive sport which had prohibited players of colour from representing the country, had united black and white South Africans – and it sparked my ongoing cherish-affair with the game.
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Source: theguardian.com