15 March 2016
From the Headmaster’s Desk:
Sport, Pressure and the Development of Character…
Dear Johannian Community
The summer sports season came to an end over the weekend of the 5th and 6th of March, with the South
African Schools Rowing Championships out at Roodeplaat; the various Water Polo tournaments at King
Edward’s (Open), Parktown Under 15 and Jeppe Under 14. The Basketball players and Cricketers rounded
off their seasons with a full round of matches against St David’s Marist, Inanda. The Tennis boys who recently
won promotion to the premier league, will have been delighted with their performance in coming second in
the Gauteng Schools Championships. All-in-all we can be happy with our sportsmen and their achievements
over the Easter Term.
No sooner had the summer sport’s equipment been packed away, than the Rugby poles went up on Burger
and the sound of the Hockey balls hitting the back boarding and goals permeated the air. We are into the
winter season. There is always an air of excitement and purpose when we start the Rugby and Hockey
seasons. Unlike the summer sports which are split over many different venues, the winter sports tend to be
traditional Derby Days, with Rugby and Hockey being played at the same venues. Although trials and team
selections only began during this past week, the reality is that there is now a huge overlap between the
seasons, and squads of aspirant 1st Team players and A Team Rugby and Hockey boys have been out on
the fields for weeks in the early mornings and evenings preparing for the start of the season.
As you are aware many schools have directors of individual sports and teams of experts, including
conditioning coaches, biokineticists, dieticians et al, and their job is to make sure that the boys are in peak
condition when the season starts. The hype around 1st Team sport and especially Rugby, places huge stress
on coaches, players, and dare I say it, parents and Old Boys. School sport has become very professional,
but at a price. The attention paid in the media to sport and the publishing of national rankings adds to that
pressure. The word ‘amateur’ i.e. those who played sport for the love of it, which is derived from the Latin
for ‘to love’, has taken on negative connotations and now is a synonym for ineptitude and sloppiness, as in
‘that was a rank amateur performance’. The stakes are high and the pressure to perform weighs heavily on
the shoulders of those young men who run out in front of hundreds of cheering spectators every Saturday.
Too much store is placed on a successful Rugby season and sadly this has led to intense competition to
secure the top talent through sports scholarships, bursaries and other means. Sometimes, as a Head you
feel as if your competence and leadership is being assessed on the results of your 1st Rugby side. Some
years ago at St Andrew’s College, after a desperately close loss in the last minute to unfancied but bitter
rivals, I was advised (jocularly??) by a member of Council, ‘You’d better dust off your CV, Boet!’.
St John’s College
St David Road, Houghton,
Johannesburg, 2198
South Africa
T: +27 (10) 492 0300
F: +27 (11) 645 3001
E: [email protected]
For more information visit stjohnscollege.co.za
ANGLICAN DIOCESAN COLLEGE OF JOHANNESBURG
Headmaster: Paul Edey BA HDE (WITS) Hons (SA) FDE (RAU) PMD (GIBS)
Visitor: The Rt Revd Dr Steve Moreo MA (UP) PhD (UP)
Fear of failure can cause crippling anxiety in a sportsman and lead to a loss of flair, inspiration and creativity.
American singer, Bob Dylan, argues that inspiration needs to be protected from too much ‘grown-up selfanalysis’. It is a huge challenge for a coach to find the balance between producing a creative, uninhibited
team who clearly enjoy themselves, and a fearful, inhibited, anxious set of automatons who play to rigid
instructions. The coach’s last words to the boys as they huddle together before running onto the field should
be ‘Go out there and enjoy yourselves’. All of us need to remember why we play sport at school. It is not
played for the bragging rights of the Old Boys and parents, or for a place in the national rankings; or indeed
for the egos of the coaches, it is played for the benefit of the players.
As schoolboys enter the senior years of high school, they know that talent is not enough to keep them in a
1st Team or an A side. That talent has to be accompanied by hard work and the resilience to bounce back
from disappointment and defeat. We need to remember though, whilst schoolboy sport has become
increasingly professional, these boys are not full-time professionals and in their busy schedules, they have
to balance their academic work and all the other things that they are involved in, such as their culturals and
leadership portfolios.
Sport teaches us lessons for life; it teaches us a great deal about character and it also teaches us how to
handle the giddy heights of success, and especially disappointment. How does your son respond to
disappointment? Does he blame everyone else but himself; his teammates the coach and the match officials,
when he suffers a downer? The role of parents is very important and behind so many successful, welladjusted schoolboy sportsmen are committed and involved parents, who turn out Saturday after Saturday to
support their son and the school through thick and thin. It is important that you watch your son no matter
what side he is playing for and that you encourage him when he is down. Don’t place too much emphasis
on the results and don’t criticise his teammates, the coach and others when he or the team don’t do well.
Please do not try and relive your sporting career through your son. It is also important for the ethos of our
school that we are sporting spectators, both on the schoolboy stands and amongst the parents and Old Boys.
We need to keep our support positive and applaud good play from both sides. The boys are under pressure
enough without negative comments that create tension on the field.
St John’s aspires to excellence in all that we do and we play to win, but we also want to produce happy,
balanced and well-rounded young men who are magnanimous in victory and gracious in defeat. We look
forward to a most successful season of Hockey and Rugby and all the camaraderie and spirit that is
generated on and off the field in a traditional boys’ school.
Kind regards
P A Edey
Headmaster
Acknowledgements to Keith Richardson – Former Head of Wynberg Boys’ High School)
Fixtures Scheduled to the end of Term
Fixture
Dates
Under 14A Hockey - Nomads Festival
Friday 18 March – Sunday 20 March
FNB Classic Clash vs Parktown
Saturday 19 March
Under 14A Rugby Festival
Saturday 19 March – Sunday 20 March
Under 16 Nomads Hockey Festival
Friday 25, Saturday 26, Sunday 27 and
Monday 28 March
21st Easter Rugby Festival
Thursday 24, Saturday 26 and Monday 28
March
Under 16 Private Schools’ Rugby
Wednesday 30 March – Saturday 2 April
Festival
Rugby and Hockey vs St Alban’s
Saturday 2 April
Under 14 ISHF Hockey Tournament
Saturday 9 April – Monday 11 April
Wynberg Rugby Tour
Thursday 28 April – Monday 2 May
Venue
Maritzburg College
At Home
Parktown Boys’
Grey College
Hilton
St Alban’s
St Alban’s
Wynberg
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