The Blue Wave continues to crash on the rugby shores

What a season it has been for CPUT Rugby. This year we participated in the Western Province Super League C which was a new venture for CPUT as it was the first season that we have participating in the Super Leagues. It was a great unknown to players as majority of our players has never played club rugby before, this is due to most of them joining CPUT straight of School at the end of 2019 and with Covid disrupting club rugby for the past two years.

Nevertheless, we looked at the season as an exciting challenge ahead and got stuck straight into it. We landed back in Cape Town the Friday after our Varsity Shield Final and the Saturday, we had to fall into our First league fixture which was tough for the players as there was no time to recover. The first fixture was a great surprise to the players as they were not use too playing in front of club spectators which could be challenging at times but one of our core values is ADAPTABILITY, and so we did. Winning our first game with a bonus point.

During the preparation and the course of the tournament we had be quite cognisance of how we managed players training loads in conjunction with their studies, as it was a long season to complete. In this sense our squad rotation played a big factor in managing players loads to keeping them competition balanced and not over trained or played, which also help when it came to players coping with their academics.

The season was a tough one even though we only lost two out of the 16 fixtures that we played. Being a university club, the oppositions always put huge targets on our backs but the players showered great maturity to always keep CPUT name flying high. At the beginning of the season, we commitment to playing a brand of rugby that we would enjoy and that would excite our supporters and anyone who watched us play, and we definitely done so by gaining huge support from CPUT community and the greater WP rugby community.

During the mid-season club break we headed off to USSA 15’s which we were able to give players from our extended squad opportunity to participate in the tournament (allowing some of the stalwarts to rest and recover), they done exceptionally well and just fell short in the final of our section to UCT.

We then started the second half of the season with a bang, playing the log leaders Strand RFC who were unbeaten at the time (our two losses came I the first half of the season) and were determined to keep it that way but in true CPUT fashion the BLUE

Alastair Theys

WAVE came out in full force and played some exceptional rugby to give the log leaders their first loss of the season. From this point CPUT went unbeaten for the rest of the season meeting Strand RFC once again in the finals. The finals were a challenge for us as half managed and half of our first team was at USSA 7s, never the less we went into the final with one thing on our minds and that was to lift the league trophy and that we DID.

Gaining promotion to the Super League B is huge for CPUT Rugby, as this will ensure that we play against stronger opposition week in and week out, by doing so this will help us improve not just on the field but off the field as well. The next step would be the building a platform to gain promotion to the top league which is Super League A but the first challenge would be, settling in Super League B and gaining the experience to take the step to the Super League A which is one of our mid-term goals.

The future of CPUT Rugby looks bright with a lot of young talent and old, being attracted to the club.

We as CPUT Rugby would just like to thank everyone who has helped us and backed us in this journey so far (CPUT University Senior Management, CPUT community, Supporters, Students, Families, Friends, Western Province Rugby).

As always, we will try our best to keep the BLUE WAVE flowing.