Mike Greenaway: Controversy over ABs' welcome in South Africa

Sonny Bill Williams is greeted by All Black supporters in Port Elizabeth. Photo / Getty Images

The rapturous welcome the All Blacks received at Port Elizabeth airport has reopened the controversy that surrounded the similar support enjoyed by the Crusaders when the Christchurch-based team twice visited Cape Town this year.

The pictures of Port Elizabethans figuratively slitting their throats haka-style in exhibitions of raw passion as their overwhelmed heroes struggled through the arrivals hall have prompted questions - mainly from white South Africans - as to why, two decades into democracy, their black compatriots still do not support the Springboks.

Old habits die hard is the reflex refrain, but the answer is more complex and perhaps not as controversial as many think. It includes the community feeling let down by the present-day South African Rugby Union as well as the bare fact that the All Blacks play great rugby.

Of course there is the political aspect, dating back to the horrors initiated by Hendrik Verwoerd in the 60s. Naturally the disfranchised would support anyone but the sporting standard-bearers of apartheid, the Springboks, who embodied the white establishment.

Blacks would certainly support the one team that gave the Boks a hard time on the field, the All Blacks. Nobody else could rival the Boks in the amateur era.

The young South Africans who hated the Boks back then are now grandfathers and the passion they had for the Kiwis has been passed on through generations. If anything, it's grown stronger.

All Black winger Cory Jane was impressed by the airport reception. "It was crazy, but very cool. The channel that we were walking through got tighter and tighter as we got closer to the bus and people were trying to reach out and touch you. It was very special. It was very humbling to see what the black jersey means to them and the way they were chanting 'All Blacks, All Blacks' was goose-bump stuff."

But the political history is only part of it. Danville Felkers, chairman of the Eastern Cape All Blacks supporters club, which has 3000 registered members, sheds light on the fanbase.

"I was born into supporting the All Blacks. My father, grandfather and uncles are very passionate supporters, and it is very easy for new generations to continue this tradition because the All Blacks are a brilliant rugby team. They are the Manchester United of rugby. They win consistently and they win in style. People love winners."

Older members of the Port Elizabeth community are in no hurry to convert their children into Bok supporters. They feel stranded by empty promises from the game's governing body.

"Rugby has died in the schools of the [poor] northern suburbs," Felkers says. "And we have played rugby in this region forever. But we have no facilities. There has been no investment from Saru, no upliftment and we feel let down."

Once more, in a brand-new era, resentment of Saru has been channelled into supporting the Springboks' opposition.

"In our suburbs we are crying out for sport to give our teenagers something to do to keep them away from drugs and crime. Rugby can do that, but it hasn't because the system has let us down."

Saru's flagship investment in the Eastern Cape is, of course, the Southern Kings, and bully to them for resurrecting top-flight rugby in the region, but for the less affluent rugby man on the ground this means diddly squat.

"Nothing has changed at grass roots," says Felkers. "We don't feel that Saru is engaging us. We don't feel any affinity to Saru. We remain forgotten."