The Durban University of Technology (DUT) Rugby team is ecstatic after its dream of qualifying for the FNB Varsity Shield has finally become a reality.

The team has made it to the list of varsity teams who will be participating in the eagerly awaited rugby tournament, the FNB Varsity Shield 2021, set to be held next year.

Head of DUT Sport Administration department, Bongani Yengwa expressed his gratitude to all the people who have been involved with the DUT Rugby structure.

“I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Sport Officer in charge of rugby, coaching staff and the entire sport administration staff. The DUT management and most importantly the players who are the ones who actually go onto the field to perform. Not forgetting the DUT community that has supported our sport directly and indirectly,” said Yengwa.

He said they are very proud of the team as rugby is the second sport code at DUT to qualify for the Varsity Sport competition after the women’s football team qualified for Varsity Football last year.

He further explained that due to the COVID-19 pandemic all University Sports South Africa (USSA) national championships were cancelled for 2020.

Yengwa stated that they are grateful that the USSA Rugby Executive Committee picked DUT as the team that best meets all the Varsity Shield requirements.

“It is due to the team’s performance in the 2018 and 2019 USSA national championships.

Berea Rovers did assist us in our development. USSA had four sections, A, B, C and D. We played in the D section. To get into the Varsity Shield you had to win the C section. It was very frustrating. We realised this will take ages and we may never get there. Then at the beginning of 2019 we decided to make a call to the chairperson of USSA rugby. In that chat was Bongani, Stanley Govender and the team’s rugby manager. After much debate the chairperson stated that he will try to get us into the C section so that we can play to qualify for varsity shield,” said Yengwa.

Surprisingly the team found itself in the B section competing with the Varsity Shield teams, where it finished fourth.

As a result of COVID-19, Yengwa said the board agreed to promote FNB Madibaz from the Varsity Shield up to the Varsity Cup.

Apparently the board did not relegate a team down to the Varsity Shield but agreed that one team should be brought up from the USSA to the Varsity Shield, that team is DUT.

These are exciting news for the team which started playing in the fourth division of the league in the early 2000s.

Its home field was George Campbell and as beginners they found the league very challenging. Due to limited resources, the team faced many challenges in the beginning such as medical related issues, transport and lack of support.

Yengwa said after years of struggling the team resorted to approaching one of the best clubs in KwaZulu-Natal and asked to join forces with them. This partnership fell apart after three years due to the challenges with some of the players.

Even then, the team did not give up, they had to get back on their feet and enter the league on their own as DUT. The team believes making it to the Varsity Shield will open doors as Varsity Cup tournaments have sponsorships and they cannot wait for the tournament to resume since the games are shown on Supersport TV.

Yengwa said there is still a lot to do to ensure that they are ready to compete in the Varsity Shield. “It’s our duty to put up a strong enough team to be competitive. We need to acquire a field that’s on campus. We need to ensure that at least 1000 of our students watch our home games preferably dressed in our club t-shirts that they can purchase from us to bolster our funding. All players must be bona fide students of good standing and below the age 25. Our coaches must be properly qualified. We need at least three, a conditioning person, manager, physiotherapist and other support staff. We must try and draw some of them from the University itself. We also need to create internal or Res leagues,” said Yengwa.

Other participants of the tournament are: University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), Walter Sisulu University (WSU), Tshwane University of Technology (TUT), Rhodes University (RU), University of Fort Hare (UFH) and Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT).

Pictured: DUT Rugby team is ecstatic after finally qualifying for the FNB Varsity Shield set to be held next year.

Simangele Zuma