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'What the hell is that smell?': Schalk Burger reveals his Bok teammate's pre-game disaster
By Sam Smith
Former flanker Schalk Burger, who played 86 test matches for the Springboks, has shared an embarrassing story of sorts about his former teammate and good friend Jean de Villiers.
The former Springbok captain spent a number of years rooming together with Burger with the two forming a close relationship over their long careers together.
Speaking on the Aotearoa Rugby Pod, Burger gave a first hand experience with De Villiers in 2007 when the Springboks hosted England for two tests in June ahead of what would be a rematch in the Rugby World Cup final months later.
"I shared a room with Jean de Villiers for yonks," Burger told the Aotearoa Rugby Pod panel.
"He's such a decent bloke but give him two beers and he turns into something else. He goes absolutely ballistic.
Burger recounted the story of De Villiers dressing room accident moments before the side took the field in Bloemfontein to play the touring English.
De Villiers experienced what can only be described as a 'code brown wardrobe malfunction' after failing to heed the advice of Burger who warned the midfielder something bad would happen.
"My favourite story about him is actually on field. We were roommates and we were playing in Bloemfontein in 2007, just before the World Cup against England," he recounted.
"Place was absolutely packed, 45,000 people there. He's lying next to me and he used to wear these tight medic pants, and the white Springbok shorts.
"He's lying there letting out some big farts and I'm like, 'partner, this is not going to end well', one of them is definitely going to follow through.
"My words weren't even out of my mouth, I could hear something just go, straight through.
"The sheer panic on this bloke's face, he didn't know whether he could get up, he's got white shorts on.
"The assistant coach Gert Smal comes to him and says 'Jean, you've really got to call through to the forwards' before he's like 'what the hell is that smell?
"The panic when he [De Villiers] got up, he took like two steps and everything started running down his legs."
The incident threw Burger off his game so much he was still thinking about it on the field after the kick-off.
"I could not recover in time for the game, I took the first kick-off giggling. How could I experience this happening."
"He had to sprint off the pitch and get the team manager to get a new set of jumpers.
"It was absolutely incredible to witness."
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The boy needs to bulk up if wants to play 10 or 11 to handle those hits, otherwise he could always make a brilliant reserve for the wings if he stays away from the stretcher.
Go to commentsIn another recent article I tried to argue for a few key concept changes for EPCR which I think could light the game up in the North.
First, I can't remember who pointed out the obvious elephant in the room (a SA'n poster?), it's a terrible time to play rugby in the NH, and especially your pinnacle tournament. It's been terrible watching with seemingly all the games I wanted to watch being in the dark, hardly able to see what was going on. The Aviva was the only stadium I saw that had lights that could handle the miserable rain. If the global appeal is there, they could do a lot better having day games.
They other primary idea I thuoght would benefit EPCR most, was more content. The Prem could do with it and the Top14 could do with something more important than their own league, so they aren't under so much pressure to sell games. The quality over quantity approach.
Trim it down to two 16 team EPCR competitions, and introduce a third for playing amongst the T2 sides, or the bottom clubs in each league should simply be working on being better during the EPCR.
Champions Cup is made up of league best 15 teams, + 1, the Challenge Cup winner. Without a reason not to, I'd distribute it evenly based on each leauge, dividing into thirds and rounded up, 6 URC 5 Top14 4 English. Each winner (all four) is #1 rank and I'd have a seeding round or two for the other 12 to determine their own brackets for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. I'd then hold a 6 game pool, home and away, with consecutive of each for those games that involve SA'n teams. Preferrably I'd have a regional thing were all SA'n teams were in the same pool but that's a bit complex for this simple idea.
That pool round further finalises the seeding for knockout round of 16. So #1 pool has essentially duked it out for finals seeding already (better venue planning), and to see who they go up against 16, 15,etc etc. Actually I think I might prefer a single pool round for seeding, and introduce the home and away for Ro16, quarters, and semis (stuffs up venue hire). General idea to produce the most competitive matches possible until the random knockout phase, and fix the random lottery of which two teams get ranked higher after pool play, and also keep the system identical for the Challenge Cup so everthing is succinct. Top T2 side promoted from last year to make 16 in Challenge Cup
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