Tuesday, 19 July 2011

Major rugby blow

After much speculation and initial denials, Zululand Rugby Academy (ZRA) Chairman Andre Kilian has now admitted that the Academy’s rugby playing arm is relocating to East London this week. In what is regarded as a major blow to the City’s future rugby fortunes, Kilian confirmed that the Academy’s U19 and U21 players are going down to the Eastern Cape to take part in the Border trials. Players who do not make the cut for the Border side will have the choice of staying on and playing under the Zululand Academy banner (but from now on based in East London) or making their own alternate arrangements, be it returning to Zululand or Durban if they want to make a go of it to get into the Sharks camp. One of the motivations for the drastic move was the fact that only a small number of ZRA players were selected for the Sharks sides despite both the U 20 A and B teams having a ‘grand slam’ season, winning both the KZN leagues they played in. Killian said the High Performance Centre has been set up in East London to give Academy players a better chance of being selected for the Border sides.
Biokineticists Jason and Donna Sivil working with the Academy will also relocate to East London. Kilian also confirmed rumours that the Academy kitchen had been closed, but pointed out no workers had been fired. ‘All staff were working on a contact basis which we chose not to renew.’ Yet, despite the player exodus, Killian remains adamant that the Academy is not ‘closing down’. ‘Closing means no longer continuing to trade, which is definitely not the case. ‘Rugby development projects, coaching clinics and the Boksmart division of the ZRA will still continue to operate in Zululand.’ ‘All I can say is that we are still very much in business.' Kilian also made it clear that the ZRA would continue to support local rugby and cited the ZRA exceeding its sponsorship of the Empangeni Rugby Club as a measure of the continued good faith between the Academy and local rugby.

Reaction
Senior Empangeni Rugby Club officials expressed their disappointment at the move. ‘I still haven’t had any confirmation of the move,’ said Simon Harvey. ‘The object of the Academy was not to create a profit-making entity. The concept seven years ago was to establish a nursery of young players for the future of the Empangeni club and the Zululand Rugby Sub-union. ‘They can do what they want. We will continue to soldier on, but they could have informed us about their intention a month ago,’ said Harvey. Chris Edwards expressed his disappointment, saying the region would be losing many quality players. ‘We’ll now be back where we were seven years ago and have to rebuild our club with local talent. ‘This is a big setback, but not a train smash. We will overcome the challenges.’