The return of brave little mouse Allister Coetzee

When Allister Coetzee touched down in Port Elizabeth with his team last Sunday afternoon, he had a spring in his step, and not just from the previous night’s series-levelling victory over Ireland.

When Coetzee’s feet touched terra firma after the 90-minute flight from Johannesburg, the 53-year-old was completing a long and winding round trip, returning to the city where he established his rugby roots.

Coetzee was home and in the afterglow of his first victory as South Africa’s new head coach, he was loving every minute of it. Yet his background is living history of another journey, that of South African rugby through the troubled and divisive era. When the colour bar invoked by the racist regime prevented talented players like the young Eastern Cape scrum-half from testing his skills with and against whites.