{"id":16981,"date":"2023-07-03T18:14:50","date_gmt":"2023-07-03T16:14:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rugby.supersportschools.com\/?p=16981"},"modified":"2023-07-03T18:14:50","modified_gmt":"2023-07-03T16:14:50","slug":"western-province-dominant-on-the-opening-day-of-craven-week-in-george","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/?p=16981","title":{"rendered":"Western Province dominant on the opening day of Craven Week in George"},"content":{"rendered":"
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PHOTO: Frans Lombard\/Actionpix<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

GEORGE. – It is clear that the side who want to take top honours as the 58th Craven Week in George will have to first get past Western Province.<\/p>\n

Western Province produced a dominant performance in the main match of the opening day at Outeniqua Park to defeat the hosts, South Western Districts, by 42-12.<\/p>\n

It was Western Province’s tenth successive victory at the Craven Week. The team has been crowned the non-official champions at the last three tournaments (2022, 2019 and 2018).<\/p>\n

Flanker Divan Fuller<\/strong> showed that he is without a doubt a player to look out for in future. He was superb on the ground as well as troubling the home side’s defence with some bullocking runs.<\/p>\n

Fuller will without a doubt have received more than a couple of ticks from the SA Schools selectors after this performance.<\/p>\n

The other standout performance came from outside Gino Cupido<\/strong> who also appeared on the pitch after half-time. He sliced through SWD’s defence almost at will. Cupido represented the SA Schools A-side as a winger in 2022.<\/p>\n

Flyhalf, Kyle Smith<\/strong>, dictated play with some excellent tactical kicking as well as providing his backline with quality opportunities throughout the game. The eighthman, Aidan Norris<\/strong>, also has a monster of a match supporting Fuller in the physical aspects of the match.<\/p>\n

SWD was better than what the scoreline reads. The home side created more than enough opportunities to score but squandered almost all of them. The tighthead prop, Juan Kleinhans<\/strong>, put forth a solid performance for the Ostrich farmers, while winger JJ Daters<\/strong> was probably his side’s standout performer on the day.<\/p>\n

The Sharks<\/strong> produced an impressive performance to down the Western Province XV<\/strong> by 34-24 in their clash on the opening day. The team from KwaZulu-Natal managed to built up a more than comfortable 22-5 lead at half-time.<\/p>\n

The backline was in top form as fullback, Jaco Williams<\/strong>, managed to create ample space for his side’s wingers, Siyabonga Ndlozi<\/strong> and Luyanda Kunene<\/strong>, to cause havoc to Western Province’s defence. Ndlozi scored a brace of tries, while Kunene also rounded off one of his side’s movements.<\/p>\n

The Sharks’ flyhalf, Chris Horak<\/strong>, could also feel more than happy with his performance as his distribution and game management was excellent. Outside centre, Campbell Ridl<\/strong>, also had a good day at the office. He stands 1.96m tall in his socks but showed why he is rated as the top outside centre in KwaZulu-Natal. Pure class.<\/p>\n

Scorers:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Western Province 42 (23) –<\/strong> Try: Zeke January, Cilliers Viljoen, Albie Bester, Haashim Pead, Xola Nyali, Gino Cupido. Conversion: Kyle Smith (3). Penalties: Smith (2). South Western Districts 12 (7) –<\/strong> Tries: Ashwen Damons, Andrew Stopforth. Conversion: Elgeron Meyer.<\/p>\n

Sharks 34 (22) \u2013<\/strong> Tries: Siyabonga Ndlozi (2), Campbell Ridl, Jaco Williams, Luyanda Kunene. Conversions: Chris Horak (3). Penalty: Horak. Western Province XV 24 (5) \u2013<\/strong> Tries: Enslin Claasen, Juma Amissi, HB Odendaal, Torren February. Conversions: Daniel van der Merwe (2).<\/p>\n

  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GEORGE. – It is clear that the side who want to take top honours as the 58th Craven Week in George will have to first get past Western Province. Western Province produced a dominant performance in the main match of the opening day at Outeniqua Park to defeat the hosts, South Western Districts, by 42-12. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16983,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.ssschoolsplus.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}