Nel and Kruger qualify for KZN panel

ZULULAND Sub Society Rugby Referees members Andre Nel and Casper Kruger qualified for the KZN referee development panel after passing a ‘yo-yo’ fitness test on Monday evening at Richards Bay High School.

The referees had to reach level 16.5 on the 40m shuttle test.

The participants had to make it to the mark, before the next signal beep. As the levels increased, so did the speed of the beeps.

They had three failure warnings before being pulled out of the test.

Nel ran a 16.5, Kruger a 16.8 and third candidate Velenkosi Shabane 15.5, just falling short of the qualification’s mark.

SARU referee Marius Jonker was there for support and will be running his test with SARU later this year.

Nel and Kruger will attend the KZN referee panel camp at Kings Park in Durban on Saturday and Sunday.

‘It feels great to have qualified and know that all my hard work over the festive season finally paid off,’ said Nel.

‘But we still have to referee one local and one away game under supervision from a member of the KZN referee society to get our grading.’

Depending on how the grading goes, the two local referees will be able to ref first division to Premier Reserve League matches at club level.

This is great news for Zululand who will have four teams competing in the Premier Reserve League this year.

This means that instead of Durban-based referees having to travel down to blow the Rhinos and Richards Bay games, these two local lads can.

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