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<\/p>\nFrancois Pienaar received the World Cup trophy from Nelson Mandela in rugby\u2019s most iconic image <\/p>\n
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It remains the most iconic image in rugby history. In fact, it has legitimate claim to be up there with the likes of Muhammad Ali standing over Sonny Liston, Tommie Smith and John Carlos\u2019s black power salutes on the Olympic podium and Diego Maradona leaping above Peter Shilton for his \u2018Hand of God\u2019 moment as one of the most iconic photos in all of sport.<\/p>\n
Nelson Mandela shaking hands with Francois Pienaar and handing him the 1995 Rugby World Cup after a South Africa victory over New Zealand in front of 63,000 people at Ellis Park in Johannesburg.<\/p>\n
If a picture is normally worth a thousand words, this one was worth considerably more and carried a greater power than any speech.<\/p>\n
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Nelson Mandela wore a Springboks jersey with No 6 on the back (Pienaar\u2019s number) to present the trophy to Francois Pienaar <\/p>\n
Mandela, the Black freedom fighter turned president of a divided nation, openly and joyously supporting his country at rugby \u2013 the traditionally Afrikaner sport that had historically seen Black South Africans cheering for the opposition.<\/p>\n
Mandela wearing a South African rugby jersey and cap, both of which were adorned with a springbok, formerly the very symbol of apartheid, rallying the entire nation \u2013 Black and white \u2013 around the team.<\/p>\n
Pienaar, the blond Afrikaner captain almost disbelievingly receiving the trophy from a president wearing his No 6 on the back of his jersey, helping provide one of South Africa\u2019s most enduring and defining images of racial unity at the most important time.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen the final whistle blew South Africa changed for ever. It\u2019s incomprehensible,\u201d said Pienaar in an interview with The Observer<\/em> back in 2013.<\/p>\n The previous six weeks had seen the Springboks build through a home Rugby World Cup \u2013 the first they had competed in since the end of the international exile and sporting boycotts they were under, removed following the fall of apartheid, Mandela\u2019s release from prison and the first free, democratic elections open to citizens of all races in 1994.<\/p>\n The Boks battled their way into the final where they faced their great rivals, heavily-fancied New Zealand, led by the best player in the world Jonah Lomu. But South Africa dug deep and Joel Stransky\u2019s drop goal in extra-time handed them an unlikely 15-12 win that sent the stadium into raptures and meant so much more than just a World Cup trophy to the country.<\/p>\n A nation celebrated as the Springboks won the 1995 Rugby World Cup <\/p>\n \u201cDuring those six weeks what happened in this country was incredible,\u201d reflected Pienaar. “I\u2019m still gobsmacked when I think back to the profound change that happened.<\/p>\n \u201cWe started with a great leader with a fantastic vision [Mandela] who realised that sport is important for the Afrikaner white community and to earn their respect and trust. But on the other side, I have such respect for what he had to go through in the African National Congress because the springbok was a symbol of apartheid. The majority of South Africans never supported the Springboks, so to ask them to support them for the first time was a massive ask.<\/p>\n “Through the course of those six weeks, because he asked them and we came to the party in terms of playing good rugby and building a nice momentum towards the final, things happened in South Africa that were just magical.”<\/p>\n That didn\u2019t mean that things were a racially-unified rainbow of love within either the Springboks squad or the South African rugby system itself. There was just one Black player in that World Cup-winning squad \u2013 winger Chester Williams, who scored four tries in the quarter-final win over Samoa \u2013 and he revealed the racism he experienced throughout the 1990s in his authorised biography Chester \u2013 A Biography of Courage <\/em>released in 2002.<\/p>\n Springboks teammate James Small called him a \u201cf****** kaffir\u201d on the field when they played each other at club level and shunned him throughout his career. Most Springbok players also refused to join the same table as him and the other Black players at mealtimes, although he named Gary Teichmann, Werner Swanepoel and current South Africa director of rugby Rassie Erasmus as notable exceptions to that.<\/p>\n Chester Williams played for the Springboks throughout the 1990s and score four tries in the 1995 Rugby World Cup semi-final win over Samoa <\/p>\n But while Williams made clear he was \u201cdefinitely not a product of any enlightened developmental system put in place to help Black and coloured players\u201d, he still remembered that 1995 final incredibly fondly.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was the first World Cup in which South Africa was involved. We were the host country, we won and it unified the nation,\u201d said Williams in a 2013 interview. \u201cEveryone was so happy. White, Black, everyone. That day we all became legends and after the match things were so much better in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n Williams sadly became the fourth player of that 1995 side to die \u2013 after Ruben Kruger, Joost van der Westhuizen and Small \u2013 when he passed away in 2019 but the legacy and memories of that final live on, not least because the story of that Springboks side was immortalised in the Clint Eastwood-directed film Invictus, <\/em>starring Matt Damon and Nelson Mandela.<\/p>\n Twenty-eight years later and South Africa face New Zealand in a Rugby World Cup final for the first time since that day. The landscape in both countries and the world as a whole looks very different nearly three decades on but the fact that the Springboks and the All Blacks are still at the pinnacle of men\u2019s rugby is fitting.<\/p>\n The economic, political and social problems of 1995 have been replaced by different, but perhaps just as severe, problems in 2023, yet the two countries to whom rugby union means more than any other meet again in the sport\u2019s showpiece in Paris on Saturday evening.<\/p>\n There is unlikely to be a photo as iconic as Mandela and Pienaar\u2019s handshake, while the chances of a Hollywood film being made about the game are also considerably smaller, and perhaps the match isn\u2019t as important from a geopolitical perspective as its 1995 counterpart. But to those on the pitch and watching in the stands, the rematch will still mean everything.<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/static.independent.co.uk\/2023\/10\/24\/17\/GettyImages-1230378.jpg\")
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