Invest your Soul in the Game

The 2019 Springboks.

Rugby Championship winners.

World Cup winners.

Player of the Year.

Coach of the Year.

Team of the Year.

Ranked #1 in World Rugby.

South African Rugby

Rugby is much more than rugby in South Africa.

It is a symbol of the old South Africa.

It is a resurgence of the new.

It is a number 6 jersey. It is a day of reconciliation. It is leadership. It is overcoming all odds. It is achieving the impossible.

Both in sport and as a country.

When you put on a Springbok jersey you’re not just playing rugby. You’re nation-building. You’re rebuilding a broken country. You’re bringing our crazy beautiful people with all their differences together.

You’re reminding everyone of the miracle of what we’ve achieved.

Rugby is about transformation, it is about hope, it is about making a difference, it is about uniting our country.

Wearing that jersey is a massive responsibility.

16 September 2017

All Blacks 57 — South Africa 0.

Obliterated. Destroyed. The worst defeat in our history.

‘It was like watching schoolboy rugby.’

The Springboks were a shambles when Rassie became coach. We were 7th in the World. We were a joke.

We were building to a Rugby World Cup 18 months later. We would have to compete against teams that were much better, much stronger and better prepared than us.

It was a hopeless cause. We were written off.

The team were ridiculed. Players were lambasted by the press. The coach was fired.

How does a team respond to that pressure?

Pressure is not knowing where your next meal is coming from

30M people live in poverty in South Africa. 30M.

Poverty: a state or condition in which a person or community lacks the financial resources and essentials for a minimum standard of living.

Poverty: when the income level from employment is so low that basic human needs can’t be met.

Poverty.

We have the most unequal society in the world.

Friday’s expensive dinner is a month’s groceries for a family. The whiskey you drank on Saturday is equal to a youngster’s school fees. The car you drive is greater than generations of wealth accumulated across whole communities.

You think you earned these privileges.

You think you deserve them.

…

Change Things

Our country is both beautiful but brutal, expansive yet suffocating, affirming and devastating. It is like no other. It’s a land that asks difficult questions to all who live in it.

It touches your core. It cuts you in half.

Blood. Tears. Grief.

Rainbows and floods. Floods and rainbows.

Over and over again.

It is here that we have been born and where we must rise. It is here where we must stand and be counted. It is here where it is our duty to make things better.

Integrity: doing what is right when no-one is watching.

Responsibility: owning the situation and making it better.

Remember where you come from. Honour those who have come before you. Be thankful for what you have. Don’t waste your potential. Use your talents wisely. Dedicate yourself to a greater cause.

Be principles driven. Serve values that are timeless.

Act from your core. Breathe from your centre.

Have impact. Change things. Make a difference.

‘It is your great privilege to give hope.’

Be purpose-driven. Do things that are meaningful. Do work that will make your children proud. Look yourself in the mirror every morning. Leave a mark on the world. Live passionately. Care deeply about your work.

Solve important problems.

Put on a number 6 jersey.

Lead with your heart.

Invest your Soul in the Game

An EXPLORE Value.