SARU Gold Cup

SARU Gold Cup
	Current season, competition or edition:; 2016 SARU Gold Cup
Formerly	SARU Community Cup
Sport	Rugby union
Founded	2013
Inaugural season	2013
No. of teams	20
Countries	South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe
Most recent; champion(s)	False Bay
Most titles	Rustenburg Impala (2)
TV partner(s)	Supersport
Sponsor(s)	Cell C

Last updated February 19, 2019

The SARU Gold Cup is the premier rugby union club competition in South Africa for non-university teams.^[1]

Rugby union, commonly known in most of the world simply as rugby, is a contact team sport which originated in England in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its most common form, a game is between two teams of 15 players using an oval-shaped ball on a rectangular field with H-shaped goalposts on each try line.

South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by 2,798 kilometres (1,739 mi) of coastline of Southern Africa stretching along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; and to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini (Swaziland); and it surrounds the enclaved country of Lesotho. South Africa is the largest country in Southern Africa and the 25th-largest country in the world by land area and, with over 57 million people, is the world's 24th-most populous nation. It is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere. About 80 percent of South Africans are of Sub-Saharan African ancestry, divided among a variety of ethnic groups speaking different African languages, nine of which have official status. The remaining population consists of Africa's largest communities of European (White), Asian (Indian), and multiracial (Coloured) ancestry.

History

The SARU Community Cup logo

On 20 September 2012, the South African Rugby Union announced the launch of the SARU Community Cup to replace the National Club Championships. The inaugural edition started in February 2013. Several rugby union clubs in South Africa are affiliated to universities, which already competed in the annual Varsity Rugby tournaments. The Community Cup was created as a national competition for non-university clubs.

The South African Rugby Union (SARU) is the governing body for rugby union in South Africa and is affiliated to World Rugby. It was established in 1992 as the South African Rugby Football Union, from the merger of the South African Rugby Board and the non-racial South African Rugby Union (SACOS), and took up its current name in 2005.

The 2013 SARU Community Cup was the first season of the SARU Community Cup competition and was contested from 16 February to 1 April 2013. The tournament is the top competition for non-university rugby union clubs in South Africa.

Varsity Rugby is the collective name for four South African rugby union competitions involving the top rugby playing universities in the country. It was launched in 2008, with eight teams participating in the Varsity Cup competition and each university's internal champions competing in the Koshuis Rugby Championships. In 2011, a second tier competition called the Varsity Shield was added, increasing the number of participating universities to thirteen. A Young Guns tournament for the Under-20 side of the Varsity Cup teams was launched in 2012. A further expansion for the 2017 season saw three additional universities added to the Varsity Shield, totalling sixteen teams.

After three seasons during which the matches were played over the Easter weekend, it was rebranded as the SARU Gold Cup, moved to a timeslot later in the year and also included teams from Namibia and Zimbabwe.^[2]

Format

Each season, twenty teams qualify for the Gold Cup from the club leagues of the fourteen provincial unions in South Africa. In addition, the Blue Bulls Limpopo sub-union also entered a team every year and from 2016 onwards, the champions of the Namibian and Zimbabwean club competitions would also enter. The defending champions of the Gold Cup would automatically qualify to the next edition. Each of the provincial unions would nominate a team which would automatically qualify for the competition – it is dependent on the rules of the individual league whether this will be the team that finishes top of the log during the round-robin stage of the competition or the title play-off winner. All university teams are ineligible and would be excluded from participation.

In addition to the automatic qualifiers, the remainder of the participating teams would consist of wildcard entries. For 2013 and 2014, teams were nominated to enter a wildcard draw, but from 2015 onwards a play-off competition was introduced, where the second-best eligible teams from the provincial unions could play off for the remaining spots.

The 2015 SARU Community Cup will be the third season of the SARU Community Cup competition. The qualification to the tournament will take place in 2014, while the competition proper will be contested in 2015. The tournament is the top competition for non-university rugby union clubs in South Africa.

The format of the Gold Cup is the same as the Rugby World Cup. The teams are divided into four pools, each containing five teams. They then play four pool games, playing every other teams in their respective pools once. Each team plays two home games and two away games.

The winner and runner-up of each pool enter the play-off stage, held at a neutral venue over the Easter long weekend each year. The play-offs consist of quarter finals, semi-finals and the final. The winner of each pool meets the runner-up of a different pool in the quarter final. The winner of each quarter-final goes on to the semi-finals and the semi-final winners to the Cup final. The losing semi-finalists play each other in the 3rd-place play-off. The losing quarter finalists meet in the Plate semi-final, the winners of which will play in the Plate final, with the losers playing in the 7th-place play-off.

Sponsorship

The sponsored version of the logo

In February 2013, it was announced that mobile phone provider Cell C would sponsor the SARU Community Cup for three seasons, with the tournament being known as the Cell C Community Cup.^[3]

Cell C Limited is a South African mobile company.

Teams

The teams that participated in the SARU Gold Cup and their finishing positions are as follows:

SARU Community / Gold Cup participants
Team	Union	Community Cup			Gold Cup
Team	Union	2013	2014	2015	2016	2017
African Bombers	Eastern Province	12	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Bloemfontein Crusaders	Free State	15	10	15	N/A	N/A
Bloemfontein Police	Free State	20	N/A	N/A	18	10
Boksburg	Falcons	N/A	15	N/A	N/A	N/A
Brakpan	Falcons	3	9	N/A	4	N/A
Bridgton	SWD	N/A	17	N/A	N/A	N/A
Centurion	Blue Bulls	N/A	7	N/A	N/A	N/A
College Rovers	Kwa-Zulu Natal	2	4	6	6	2
Despatch	Eastern Province	1	5	4	N/A	N/A
Durban Collegians	Kwa-Zulu Natal	N/A	N/A	9	14	N/A
Durbanville-Bellville	Western Province	5	N/A	1	3	N/A
East London Police	Border	N/A	N/A	N/A	16	N/A
Evergreens	SWD	8	N/A	12	7	N/A
False Bay	Western Province	N/A	N/A	N/A	2	1
Hamiltons	Western Province	N/A	3	3	N/A	N/A
Mossel Bay Barbarians	SWD	N/A	14	N/A	N/A	N/A
Noordelikes	Limpopo Blue Bulls	19	19	19	N/A	N/A
Northam Rhinos	Limpopo Blue Bulls	N/A	N/A	N/A	17	8
Old Georgians	Zimbabwe	N/A	N/A	N/A	13	9
Old Selbornians	Border	10	8	10	11	17
Pirates	Golden Lions	N/A	N/A	N/A	10	N/A
Port Elizabeth Police	Eastern Province	N/A	N/A	17	8	N/A
Progress (George)	SWD	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	6
Progress (Uitenhage)	Eastern Province	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	11
Pretoria Police	Blue Bulls	6	N/A	5	5	N/A
QBR	Blue Bulls	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	3
Raiders	Golden Lions	9	N/A	11	N/A	15
Roodepoort	Golden Lions	7	2	N/A	N/A	N/A
Roses United	Boland	13	6	N/A	N/A	12
Rustenburg Impala	Leopards	4	1	2	1	4
Sasol	Mpumalanga	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	7
Sishen	Griquas	17	11	16	9	16
SK Walmers	Western Province	11	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Spring Rose	Eastern Province	N/A	12	N/A	N/A	N/A
Springs	Falcons	N/A	N/A	18	N/A	N/A
Swallows	Border	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	14
Tygerberg	Western Province	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	5
Vaal Reefs	Leopards	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	20
Vereeniging	Falcons	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	13
Villagers Worcester	Boland	16	N/A	13	19	N/A
Wanderers	Golden Lions	N/A	N/A	7	N/A	N/A
Welkom	Griffons	N/A	20	N/A	N/A	19
Welkom Rovers	Griffons	14	13	20	15	N/A
Wesbank	Boland	N/A	18	8	N/A	N/A
Western Suburbs	Namibia	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	18
White River	Mpumalanga	18	N/A	N/A	20	N/A
Windhoek Wanderers	Namibia	N/A	N/A	N/A	12	N/A
Witbank Ferros	Mpumalanga	N/A	16	14	N/A	N/A

The top eight teams are ranked by the results of the finals tournament. Teams 9 to 20 are ranked by their final log position in the pool stages.
N/A indicates the team did not qualify to the relevant edition of the SARU Gold Cup.
(Q) indicates the team qualified to the next edition of the SARU Gold Cup.

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References

↑ "Club rugby in South Africa receives a major boost". South African Rugby Union. 20 Sep 2012. Retrieved 20 Sep 2012.
↑ "Club rugby revival enters new 'Golden' era" (Press release). South African Rugby Union. 14 December 2015. Retrieved 14 December 2015.
↑ "Cell C named as Community Cup sponsor". South Africa Rugby Union. 6 February 2013. Retrieved 6 February 2013.