Coming to a field near you: Women playing the game
You’re forgiven for not knowing that SA has a Springbok Women’s Rugby side — but only just. We should know better, that’s the point for Captain Babalwa Latsha, who led her team to a victorious World Cup-qualifying match last month. It gives SA a guaranteed spot to represent the continent at the Rugby World Cup for women in 2021, in New Zealand.
“People don’t know about the SA Rugby women’s side because we don’t get the media, the sponsorship or the pro contracts like the men,” says the 25-year- old from Khayelitsha.
Latsha stumbled into rugby at the University of the Western Cape five years ago while starting a law degree. She says she just “found her tribe and found her sport. I love that rugby is a physical, full-contact sport and I can challenge stereotypes of what a woman should be.”
Latsha has completed an LLB and is a tighthead prop for the Springboks. She says, half joking, of being in a scrum: “I just bite on my mouth guard and think ‘I’m going to break your necks’.”
She has high hopes for women’s rugby in SA even as they still need money and fans behind them. There’s talk she could go pro with overseas clubs sniffing, but for now Latsha trains youngsters at rugby clinics including in Khayelitsha, where she grew up.
For programme manager of the Springboks women’s team Mahlubi Puzi, now is the time to build up players in terms of quality and numbers so there’s a strong pool come the World Cup in two years’ time.
Things are shifting with more global attention and exposure for women’s rugby. Since 1991 a Rugby World Cup for women has been held every four years. The US won the first event with 12 teams competing.
For the Springbok women’s team their focus right now is on two big matches in
Port Elizabeth against Spain and in Cape Town against Scotland at the end of the month. So if you’re a rugby fan you know where you’ve got to be.