It is fitting that Damian de Allende, known to his mates as Doogz, will be playing his landmark 100th game for his country against New Zealand. When I interviewed the Springbok centre for Kick-off magazine Q and A earlier this year, his answer was immediate when he was asked about his toughest opponents - “Definitely the All Blacks!”
There is a lot of respect between the teams and the rugby nations and after his exploits against them since he made his Bok debut against Argentina in the 2014 Rugby Championship, there will be a lot of respect from New Zealanders towards a man who has won two World Cups. He wasn’t in the team that scored a record 43-10 win in Wellington last year or for that matter the 35-7 win in London in 2023, but he has been an almost constant presence since the breakthrough win against the Kiwis in Rassie Erasmus’ first year of coaching them in 2018.
STILL THINKS ABOUT THE 2015 “NEAR MISS”
One of De Allende’s wins against the All Blacks was the one point victory in the 2023 World Cup final in Paris, something that made up for what he only belatedly got to recognise as a near miss that might have changed his career narrative, and that of the Boks, four years earlier than his first global triumph in Japan in 2019.
“My first World Cup was the one in England in 2015, and it was a very weird experience for me,” he recalled.
“I was very young then and I don’t think I understood yet the responsibility of being a Springbok. I think I only realised that after we lost to Japan, when I saw how the older guys struggled with it. I didn’t cry after the Japan game, but I cried and others did too after the following game, when we beat Samoa at Villa Park in Birmingham. That was the game our captain Jean De Villiers broke his jaw and had to leave the World Cup.
“We then went on to play one of the greatest All Black teams in the semi-final. It’s funny, myself and Handre (Pollard) and Lood (de Jager) talk about that game a lot, how close we came, because we only realised it much later, when we were at the 2019 World Cup in Japan. They were an incredibly good team and yet we were just two points away from beating them, but at the time we were young and didn’t quite realise at the time how close we came to being part of a special piece of history.”
SCHOOL COACH PLAYED BIG ROLE IN PUTTING HIM ON THE PATH
There have been plenty of special pieces of history for De Allende since 2015, and on Saturday he becomes a part of a special club of players who have played 100 times for South Africa. And yet, had it not been for the persistence of a school master, Heinrich Martin, when De Allende was in his final year at Milnerton High, his celebrated rugby career may never have happened.
Indeed, it is a little known fact that De Allende cracked the nod for Western Province Schools that year - but not for rugby. He made it in cricket. Not that cricket was even his first love. When he first started playing sports, the round ball game, soccer, was a big love.
“As a young boy I loved soccer. I’m a Liverpool supporter, but Thierry Henry was who I wanted to be,” said De Allende, who will turn 35 in November but shows no signs of slowing up and losing his passion for the sport that has made him famous.
“I was sent something recently by a woman who was in Grade 7 with me. It was what I wrote in my Grade 7 Yearbook: ‘I want to bend the ball better than David Beckham and kick better than Thierry Henry.’ I met him later in life and showed him the picture, which I have on my phone.
“It was only cricket and soccer for me at primary school, but at Milnerton High you could only play soccer from Grade 10 onwards, so I had to choose between rugby and hockey for my winter sport. My friends from primary school all played rugby so I played rugby.
“In matric there was never a day I wasn’t training in either cricket or rugby. I was part of the WP elite under-19 team cricket squad. I was an opening bowler and then because I trained quite a bit on my batting, and got lessons, I was good enough to bat No4 when I was in matric.
HARD WORK AND OVERCOMING OBSTACLES HAS BEEN A THEME
Succeeding through hard work is a theme of De Allende’s subsequent rugby career. So is overcoming obstacles. Martin, otherwise known as Coach Bobby, told us in a previous supersport.com feature on De Allende, about the effort that had to be made to get De Allende onto a rugby pathway after he was, in Martin’s view, unfairly overlooked for WP Schools selection.
“The curious thing was that he did make WP Schools, but just not at rugby, and I will tell you why - there’s one word for it: Politics,” said Martin.
Politics in that instance was a reference to the prejudices many felt were prevalent at that time when it came to choosing between Cape Town’s southern suburb schools and northern suburb schools, and at that time Milnerton High was not recognised as a top, established rugby school. Which made De Allende’s pathway more difficult to negotiate. But thanks to Martin, he was put onto a post-school rugby path that started in the latter part of his final year at school.
“What happened was that after Damian never made it into the WP Schools team, I took him to Nazeem Adams, the WP under-19 coach, and asked him to take a look at him,” recalls Martin.
“The under-19 team was not part of the school system, but I said to Nazeem, ‘Please give this guy a chance’. So Nazeem let him play in some trial games, and he ended up playing in every WP under-19 game after that. He played all the league games and the play-off games. WP won the competition.
“I knew he’d make it away from school interference and prejudices. We did it out of school and I will always be grateful to Nazeem for giving Damian that opportunity. Sometimes you just need a chance and to be seen by the right people. I didn’t ask favours from anyone, I just asked Nazeem to give the kid a chance. Damian has repaid the faith shown in him by going on to become one of the greatest international centres.”
THAT WAS WHEN HE GOT HOOKED ON RUGBY AS A CAREER PATH
De Allende remembers his time with the under-19 team being the juncture when he became hooked on rugby and started on his journey to where he is today.
“I don’t know if I would have been lost to rugby had it not been for Mr Martin’s efforts, but I am very grateful to Mr Martin, he went out of his way to get me onto a pathway. I was only 18 at the time, my birthday is in November, so I was younger than the other guys. I won’t say I would have given up but maybe I would have explored some other opportunities. Perhaps gone overseas. “Although from a young age I knew my heart was set on playing rugby for WP and the Springboks. When I started to play for the WP under-19 rugby team in what was effectively the under-19 Currie Cup that was what got me hooked.”
There was a moment involving schools coach Martin that both he and De Allende still remember. It was when, with De Allende just being 15 at the time, Martin told him that he would go on to become a Springbok. Prophetic words indeed.
“I wouldn’t say I believed him, I think I was just 15 at the time. But I do remember that night very clearly. We were playing Bergvliet away under lights and we beat them and then I remember going to watch the first team play afterwards. I’d just played for the under-16s. While walking around the field Mr Martin, who was at the time coaching the under-14 team, came up to me to congratulate me and he said ‘If you carry on like that you will be a Springbok one day.’ It was very cool to hear, and it did have an impact on me. It was the first time anyone had said something like that. I was only 15, but it was an interaction that I still think about to this day.”
HE SAW FAILURE TO MAKE WP SCHOOLS AS A POSITIVE
It says something about De Allende as a person, and his teammate Damian Willemse spoke enthusiastically about his humility and under-stated personality when asked the question at the team announcement press conference where it was confirmed the other Damian would be playing his 100th, that he now looks back at his failure to make the WP Craven Week team as a positive.
“I am not a sour person so I look at the positives. Maybe if I made it at high school my opportunities would have been a bit different and I may have ended up thinking I was better than I was and then I wouldn’t have worked as hard as I did. My timing may have been just right.
I know Mr Martin was very frustrated at what he saw as the politics, which in that instance was southern suburb schools versus northern suburbs schools, and I do respect his opinion. But I was also sick and unable to play in one of the WP Schools trials weeks. It just didn’t work out. Everything happens for a reason.”
VARSITY CUP PROVIDED AN EARLY SPRINGBOARD
Once he got into the WP system, De Allende’s rise was meteoric. But like many other successful South African players, it was a season playing in the Varsity Cup that provided the springboard for his quick elevation from promising youngster to becoming a Springbok just two years later. He played for Ikey Tigers in 2012, made his debut for the WP senior side later that year, and was a Springbok in 2014.
“I am very grateful to the people who helped get the deal through as it helped get me my first professional contract. I was playing for Hamiltons at the time and had a deal with them but when the Ikey opportunity came up I told my dad that it would be a great opportunity to be on television and to be seen,” says De Allende.
“My dad got very involved in helping it all happen. It didn’t go that well in terms of results, that was the year we ended up playing in the promotion-relegation game, but it was an incredible experience and it was my first exposure to Kevin Foote, who I really enjoyed as a coach.”
CURRIE CUP SUCCESS AT FIRST ATTEMPT
A few months later De Allende was playing as a relative rookie in the WP team that upset the favoured Sharks team in a Durban Currie Cup final.
“I’d come on as a replacement centre against the Lions in the semi-final, in the game where Brannas (Deon Fourie) scored the winning try off the last move. I didn’t expect to be playing in the final but then Marcel Brache, who had played centre for WP for much of that season, congratulated me on my selection. It was the first I heard of it. It was very nice of Marcel to do that.
“He had played most of the games, then Jean (de Villiers) had come back from the Boks and had been injured. I expected Marcel to take Jean’s place, but instead it was myself and Juan de Jongh who lined up in the midfield in that final. We won the game and it was a great experience, but I was grateful for the way Marcel dealt with it. He said I deserved it.”
When he made his debut for the Boks in 2014 it was just a few years on from the disappointment of missing out on Craven Week selection, but he says the road wasn’t quite as plain sailing through that period as it might appear from outside. He said the key was just to be ready for whatever was thrown at him.
“I don’t want to say it was easy, but I just made sure I was always ready for whatever opportunity came my way,” he said.
“By that stage I just had a burning desire to play for the Stormers and the Boks. It was never easy. There were tough challenges both at that time and before that. But the tough times I went through early in my career just made me determined to grab the opportunity when it came.”
VERY AWARE OF HIS ROOTS
He’s continued to grab opportunities. 100 of them. And for the Boks nogal. Yet, he’s known, as Willemse pointed out about his mate, for being aware of his roots and being extremely loyal to his friends and the people who provided the platform for his career.
“For me personally it is how hard I have worked to get to where I am that motivates, as well as my great pride in where I come from,” explained De Allende.
“My family, my closest friends, we are all from the same area, we went to school together, we have great memories together, and that is very close to my heart and a big driver for me. There have been times where I have forgotten how hard I need to work, and that is always a wake up call. You realise the hard work just never stops and can’t stop. You have got to be on top for every game and try to improve on every game you play, and always ready to be for the next opportunity.”