Rumours are surfacing that Bernie Habana’s dodgy contracting (and even worse legal skills) may well come back to bite his son Bryan on the cheek.
Habana, who successfully scuppered Bakkies Botha into an iron-clad five-year deal with the Bulls will apparently have to fork out around R1M in legal fees after Botha’s case against his employers was dismissed with costs. Botha wanted to be released from his golden chains to go and earn even more money in France. His arguement was based on the flimsiest of premises, something to do with the Bulls failing to rent him a caravan on Margate beach, if memory serves. It’s not altogether surprising that the judge found in favour of sanity.
Anyway, it appears that Uncle Bernie talked his son Bryan Habana into signing a virtually identical contract with the Loftus lords, meaning that any chance of him accepting an overseas pay-packet have now disappeared, at least until 2011 when his Bulls contract expires. Talk linking him to a huge money move to Saracens has been roundly and hotly denied by enough people for us to deduce that it must have been at least partially true. I wonder if he’ll be buying a Father’s Day present next year. If so, it had better be a big one, as pops now has a million-Rand hole in his balance sheet that’ll have to be filled somehow.
In other news, the Bulls coaching “brains trust” is in a bit of a quandary after their tame capitulation against Province this weekend. Seemingly unable to fathom the tight relationship between lack of discipline and losing matches, they seem to have very little option but to include hothead Hilton Lobberts in the match 22 for this weekend’s hit-out against the Sharks. Regular skipper Wikus van Heerden is rated as a 50-50 prospect at best and lock Frans van Schouwenberg is also looking doubtful.
There is positive news amongst the backs, though, with both Derrick Hougaard and Zane Kirchner available for selection. Why a team struggling with discipline would even think of including “Spear-Tackle” Kirchner, though is beyond me, particularly given how well young Siyabonga Mangweni has played in the last two weeks.
Them’s strange folk down that way, all right!

Golden chains Rob? Is Pretoria a Utopia now?
@Flashman (Comment 1) : nah dude… Golden, cos he’s getting so much money to wear em 😉
Spain must be pleasant right about now?
Tiger Mangweni is a quality player.
@Big Fish (Comment 3) : Wish we had him
Instead of Stefan the kickboxer? Now why would you possibly want that? 🙄
Spain’s going a little bit crazy at the moment, even down here in semi-autonomous Andalucia.
I’ve escaped indoors. It’s all pretty good for the country though.
Well after the Bakkies fiasco any player who deals with the man deserves what he gets. Its clear and very apparent that the man has very little idea what he is doing. He must have studied at the Joost school of signing your name on a contract means nothing.