Player profile – Luyanda Kunene (Maritzburg College)
Maritzburg College‘s exciting counterattacking fullback Luyanda Kunene revealed something surprising when SuperSport Schools sat down for a chat with him ahead of the 2024 rugby season. Asked who had been the greatest influence on his rugby, he didn’t hesitate, replying: “Mr Marnitz”, as in Hendré Marnitz, College’s Director of Rugby.
It wasn’t his answer that was surprising. The reason behind it was.
After what he considered to be a disappointing 2022, the SA Schools flyer was demotivated and considered stopping playing the sport. Marnitz, though, persuaded him to keep going. “He told me that days aren’t the same, and I must just keep on playing and I’ll make it far. Yeah, I guess that helped me.”
It did more than help Kunene. He proved himself to be one of the most dynamic players with the ball in hand in South Africa.
If you have seen him play, then you would not be surprised to learn that his favourite player is Cheslin Kolbe. When he is counterattacking, you see flashes of the Springbok dynamo in Kunene, and anything is possible.
Rugby fans throughout South Africa learnt that during the North-South Tournament, when Maritzburg College ran out against Grey College. The Bloemfontein powerhouse hadn’t been tested until that evening, but they had to battle to record a 37-24 victory.
That margin did not do justice to Maritzburg’s efforts. A loose five minutes before and after halftime cost them. In the rest of the game, they had Grey College scrambling and one of the biggest causes of that was Kunene, who crossed for a hattrick of tries.
He had showcased his abilities against South Africa’s top team of 2023, and he didn’t slow down for the rest of the season. He shone in a 47-15 pounding of Pretoria Boys High in Pretoria and was again to the fore in the South African capital when College outplayed Affies 50-31 in a hugely impressive performance.
That game included one of his favourite tries of the year. It wasn’t his most spectacular effort, but its timing was crucial, and it gave College confidence. They had fallen 6-14 behind, with Affies scoring two converted tries to the KZN boys’ two penalties.
Then, in the 13th minute, from a scrum on the Affies’ 22, College moved the ball right, down the backline. Kunene, having summed up the situation well, told Swelithle Mbatha to grubber in behind the home side’s backs.
Makhatini stabbed the kick through. Like a flash, Kunene outstripped the turning defenders and, when the ball sat up nicely, he gathered and dived over in the right-hand corner. A successful conversion kick from Luc du Toit made it College 13-14 Affies and the visitors’ belief had been given a massive boost.
Kunene said he watches the opposition’s games before College plays them, but he doesn’t get too technical in his analysis.
He shared a simple secret. It’s one thing knowing it. It’s another thing stopping it. It is this: when he counterattacks, he tries to identify forwards and take them on. His success rate is exceptional.
Maritzburg College has brought out the best in him, he said, and the tradition of the school, which has produced more South African internationals across all sports than any other, has motivated him.
“College is a different school. The traditions [are important], like back then, when I was in second form, I used to be keen to play on Goldstone’s because we weren’t allowed onto Goldstone’s, so it gave me the hunger to make the first team.
Candidly, he admitted, he wasn’t at his best when representing South African Schools at the end of 2023, in the Under-18 International Series, which also featured France, England and the SA Schools A team. But that’s in the past.
This year, he won’t be up for SA Schools selection, because he falls outside the age limit, but that means all of his focus will be on helping Maritzburg College follow up on a strong 2023 season.
Kunene said one of his favourite games of last year was College’s clash with Westville Boys’ High on Reunion Weekend, and it was his brothers, the 1st XV, who helped him through a personal situation at home that had been plaguing him during the week in the lead-up to the game.
“I was struggling. I didn’t talk to the coaches, but my teammates knew that I was struggling. As the game went on, I don’t know, I just turned. I forgot everything at home, so that game is one of the games that sits in my heart.”
Now, in 2024, Luyanda Kunene wants to do right by his Maritzburg College brothers. His goal, simply stated, is “to leave the jersey in a better place”.
If that’s to be the case, he’ll have had plenty to do with it.
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