3 June 2025
Clifton College headed upcountry on the weekend to pay a visit to St David’s Marist Inanda, in Sandton, for seven rugby matches and 11 hockey games. St David’s produced a clean record on the rugby field, but the honours were evenly split on the hockey Astro.
RUGBY
The record shows that it has been a difficult rugby season for the Clifton College 1st XV and St David’s were convincing victors on the La Valla A Field, winning by 32 points. As a smaller school, Clifton is more prone to fluctuations of fortune on the rugby field, and 2025 is a season in which the Durban boys’ fortunes have ebbed.
Still, with Springboks Heinke van der Merwe and Waylon Murray working with the side, there is no shortage of quality coaching and leadership, and they will improve. Competition in KZN is tough, however, and much hard work lies ahead.
Clifton will, though, will feel some optimism, based on the performances of their u16A, u15A, and u14A teams. Although all three lost, by remarkably similar scores, they were very competitive and there was not much of a gap between those sides and the St David’s teams. Remembering that playing at altitude tends to take it out of a team in the latter stages of a game, Clifton has something to take away from those hard-fought defeats.
RESULTS
1st: St David’s 39-7 Clifton
2nd: St David’s 24-7 Clifton
3rd: St David’s 62-14 Clifton
16A: St David’s 26-13 Clifton
15A: St David’s 23-14 Clifton
14A: St David’s 26-12 Clifton
14B: St David’s 43-0 Clifton
HOCKEY
The meeting of the two 1st XIs, which could have broken the tiebreaker in terms of matches won, finished 2-2.
Zach Williamson and company have proven to be a tough team to break down. At the same time, though, if there’s one thing the 2025 1st team would want to do better, it’s to finish more clinically. Hence, the reason why so many of their matches have been decided by one goal. On this occasion, it finished all square.
The 1st XI, surely, wouldn’t have minded a bit of the magic generated by the u16A side, which charged to a big 7-0 win. Clifton also took victory in the u14A match by a 3-1 margin.
RESULTS
1st: St David’s 2-2 Clifton
2nd: St David’s 0-2 Clifton
3rd: St David’s 2-1 Clifton
4th: St David’s 4-0 Clifton
16A: St David’s 0-7 Clifton
16B: St David’s 3-2 Clifton
16C: St David’s B 0-4 Clifton
16D: St David’s 15B 3-0 Clifton
14A: St David’s 1-3 Clifton
14B: St David’s 2-1 Clifton
14C: St David’s 0-1 Clifton
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