Author: Lehlohonolo Scheepers

On 13 August 1921, in Dunedin, two teams played a rugby match that neither of them could have known would still be the most important fixture in the sport a century later. This is the permanent Springboks vs All Blacks head to head record: every series, the all-time numbers, the venue splits, the biggest wins and the World Cup meetings. One hundred and five years, 110 Tests, and a margin between the two countries narrow enough that a single tour can move it. Bookmark it. It gets updated after every Test they play, including the four in 2026. Springboks vs…

We have been previewing this competition every weekend without ever explaining the shape of it. That stops here. This is the Currie Cup 2026 log, the fixtures that decide it, and the honest permutations for who makes the semi-finals. It is a single page that gets refreshed after every round rather than replaced, so every weekend preview we publish from here on points into it. The competition runs from 18 July to a final on Saturday 12 September, which means it finishes the week after the third Springbok Test. Griquas are defending champions. The format, in plain language Eight teams.…

There is a version of this story where the Achilles ended it. Thembi Kgatlana was on the pitch at the 2022 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations, in the tournament South Africa were about to win for the first time in their history, when her Achilles tendon ruptured. That is the injury that finishes careers. She was 26. Four years later she is in Casablanca, back at a WAFCON, and she is the player Banyana Banyana are built around. The basics Full nameThembi Kgatlana Born2 May 1996, Mohlakeng, Gauteng PositionForward Height1.55m Current clubTigres UANL Femenil, Liga MX Femenil National teamSouth Africa…

Almost everybody is going to get this wrong, so read the next sentence twice. The Bafana Bafana AFCON 2027 qualifiers group has four teams in it, two places would normally be available, and only one team is actually going to qualify. That is not a typo and it is not pessimism. It is arithmetic, and it is the single most important thing to understand about South Africa’s next competitive campaign. Here is why, and what it takes. The Bafana Bafana AFCON 2027 qualifiers group Group D of the 2027 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, drawn on 19 May 2026 in…

You have been looking for a fixture list that does not exist. That is not your fault. There is no Rugby Championship 2026. Not delayed, not shortened, not moved to a different month. The competition that has been the spine of the southern hemisphere winter since 1996, first as the Tri Nations and then with Argentina added, is simply not being played this year. And the reason is sitting in your calendar already, taking up five and a half weeks of it. The All Blacks are touring South Africa. Eight matches, four Tests, the first proper tour between these two…

The cricket calendar may be light this week for South African fans, but there is still plenty of reason to tune in as Bangladesh’s touring side takes on a Cricket Australia XI in what promises to be a valuable warm-up contest ahead of the Test series proper. It is not Proteas cricket, but for those who follow the global game closely, this four-day fixture offers a fascinating early window into how the Tigers are travelling ahead of a significant assignment on Australian soil. Bangladesh Look to Find Form in Darwin The fixture gets underway at 02:30 SA time on Thursday,…

Four years ago this team stood on a pitch in Morocco with a trophy nobody in South African women’s football had ever lifted. On Friday, in the same country, a lot of the same players find out whether that team still exists. Banyana Banyana vs Ivory Coast is not a group game any more. It is the whole tournament compressed into ninety minutes, because South Africa have zero points, Côte d’Ivoire have three and a goal difference of plus three, and only two teams come out of Group B. Lose and it is finished with a match still to play.…

One of them did not exist four years ago. The other has been climbing since 2012. The Kruger United Milford Premiership story is the one nobody is going to write properly, because there is no traffic in it yet and both clubs are expected to go straight back down. Which is precisely why it is worth an hour of your time. In three weeks one of these squads is going to take a point off somebody’s title challenge, and you will want to have known who they were before it happened. Here is who they are, where they came from,…

For eight years, the only real question in South African football was how Mamelodi Sundowns would win it. Not whether. How. Then Orlando Pirates went and answered a different question entirely. The Betway Premiership 2026/27 season kicks off on Saturday 1 August with something this league has not had in nearly a decade: a genuinely open top of the table. Pirates are champions for the first time since 2011/12. Sundowns lost a league and won a continent in the same fortnight. Kaizer Chiefs have a new French coach who has already told everyone he is not ready to challenge. Two…

The Currie Cup rolls on this weekend with four fixtures spread across Friday to Sunday, giving South African rugby fans plenty to sink their teeth into as the competition heats up. From the Highveld to the Cape Winelands, there is no shortage of provincial pride on the line. Griquas Host Cheetahs in Friday Night Showdown The weekend gets underway at Windhoek Draught Park on Friday evening when Suzuki Griquas take on Toyota Cheetahs at 19:00. This Free State and Northern Cape rivalry never lacks intensity, and both sides will be desperate to bank points as the competition progresses. The Cheetahs…