The allegiance to the All Blacks over the Springboks runs deep, tracing its roots back to a pivotal period in South Africa's history.
When New Zealand play Ireland in thequarter finals on Saturday, Dylan Moodaley, a 32-year-old South African from Cape Town will don his favourite All Blacks t-shirt and cheer on for his country’s bitter rivals.
“Support for the All Blacks amongst black and coloured populations was born largely out of the interpretation that a defeat for the Springboks was a defeat for white South Africans and apartheid,” said Sebastian Potgieter, a South African historian and critical sport researcher at the University of Otago in New Zealand.
“For South Africa’s oppressed black and coloured populations, these players represented everything that apartheid denied them,” said Potgieter. After years of painfully slow progress in boosting the team’s racial diversity, in 2018 Siya Kolisi became the first black player to wear the armband in a Test match.A year later, he successfully skippered the Springboks to World Cup glory, helping bring many young, black South Africans closer to the sport.
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