Cecil Afrika: South Africa Sevens legend turns focus to coaching after glittering playing career

South Africa Sevens legend Cecil Afrika is happy to plough back into the shortened version of the game as a coach, after a glittering career as a player.

After an extended stint on the World Rugby Sevens Series circuit, the former Blitzboks playmaker is giving back to the sport which gave him so much joy as a player.

Afrika was part of Springbok Women’s Sevens head coach Renfred Dazel’s backroom staff as an assistant coach during the Cape Town leg of World Rugby’s Sevens Series which was held at the weekend.

Things did not go according to plan for the side, however, as they lost all their matches – against Australia, Ireland, Spain (twice) and Japan – but despite those setbacks, Afrika feels they have made strides at the Cape Town Sevens and can turn the corner in the future.

“We struggled because the girls were not match-ready, to put it like that,” he told Planet Rugby.

“You could see we competed in our matches for three and four minutes but when our opponents picked up the intensity levels, then our girls were struggling and made fundamental errors.

Still optimistic

“However, as a coach, I saw lots of positives over the weekend and although the girls really wanted to win, they don’t understand the magnitude of what we achieved over the past week and how much we grew from game to game. There were positives so hopefully we can get good support and make the women’s programme a permanent one over the next year or two.”

Afrika believes in order to improve women’s Sevens in South Africa, more attention should be given to the game at grassroots level.

“We need to do groundwork at schools level,” he said. “We really need to expose them to something like touch rugby at that stage of their careers. So that they can learn distribution and spacial skills at that level.

“Then at a later stage you can develop other skills in terms of contact and tackling and if we really put a good structure in place then we can compete with teams like Australia, New Zealand, USA, Great Britain, Ireland and Canada. If we manage to put a permanent programme in place, we will be able to compete with those countries.

“The grassroots are very important because at that level is where we’ll find the athletes. So, we need to get people to go out and find those athletes at that level to give them opportunities to compete.”

Afrika, who hails from Gqeberha, is of course renowned as one of the best playmakers to have played the shortened version of the game on World Rugby’s Sevens circuit.

The 2011 World Rugby Sevens Player of the Year was part of two Series-winning Blitzbok squads (2017 and 2018), as well as the South African team that won a Commonwealth Games gold medal in Glasgow in 2014 and a bronze one at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.

The 34-year-old made his World Series debut for South Africa in Dubai in 2009 and eventually retired after representing his country at the 2022 Rugby World Cup Sevens in Cape Town in September.

He was a shock inclusion in former head coach Neil Powell’s squad for that tournament as he had previously announced his retirement in 2020 and prior to that he last played for the Blitzboks in Vancouver in March of that year.

“I made my return in 2020 after a lengthy period on the sidelines with a grade three hamstring tear,” he said.

“I came back after 14 months on the sidelines and then it was the Covid-19 pandemic which put a hold on everything. That was during the build-up for the Olympics. It was always my intention to retire from international Sevens that year and then I eventually made that call that year.”

During his stint with the Blitzboks, Afrika played under two coaches in Powell and his predecessor Paul Treu, who both made significant impacts on his development as a player.

“I was initially exposed to Sevens rugby by former Emerging Springboks Sevens coach Denver Wannies,” said Afrika.

“I was in that programme for two years before coach Paul Treu gave me a senior Sevens contract. That’s how my Sevens career started. It was totally different experiences playing under coach Paul to playing under coach Neil.

“I’m very grateful to coach Paul. He taught me how to really play the game. How to create space and how to put team-mates into space. He taught me the technical aspects of the game. He put lots of pressure on me but prepared me well for later on in my career.

“Both he and coach Neil are technically very sharp but whereas coach Paul was very intense coach Neil was more relaxed. But both had a huge influence on my career.”

Powell recently stepped down from his position to become the director of rugby at the Sharks with Sandile Ngcobo coming in as the new Blitzboks head coach.

After winning the Dubai leg of the 2022/23 World Series, South Africa’s men’s team finished fourth in Cape Town but despite that regression, Afrika believes the Blitzboks can still reach their previous lofty heights.

Timeous process

“Obviously there’s been changes in the management and players,” he added.

“It’s going to take some time to get the Springbok Sevens to where it used to be. I think we as South Africans must just be patient.

“We were there (at the top) a few years ago and we built and got the right parts over the years to be consistent, so hopefully we can get some more good players over the next two years so that we can make sure that we are amongst the medals at the next Olympics.”

Apart from his stint with the SA Women’s Sevens side, Afrika was still playing in Europe for Monaco in the Super Sevens league this year, while he is also involved in coaching in the USA and away from the game he has also ventured into business with some ex-SA Sevens players.

“I’m privileged to have started a small business with some former Blitzboks team-mates (Kyle Brown and Philip Snyman) in the coffee industry,” he said.

“We distribute coffee and also have a coffee shop in Stellenbosch.

“I’m also busy currently at the Rhinos Rugby Academy in San Clemente, California where I do coaching on a part-time basis.”

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