Schalk:100 caps, no surrender

27 March 2015 - 02:01 By Craig Ray

Stormers flank Schalk Burger is one of those rare players who made his Super rugby debut after his Test debut, but almost everything about Burger is rare. Tomorrow, under the roof of Dunedin's Forsyth Barr Stadium, he will run out in the Stormers' colours for the 100th time. It will cap a remarkable journey that started 11 years ago against the Waratahs at Newlands.Burger burst on to the rugby landscape in 2002 as a 19-year-old human meteor, seemingly made up of pure energy and blond hair. Burger had no regard for anyone's safety, let alone his own, as he flew into rucks and tackles as if he were flying into a pile of pillows.Burger made his Springbok debut against Georgia at the 2003 World Cup. The World Player of the Year gong followed in 2004, the same year he made his Stormers debut.He won the Tri-Nations in 2004 and 2009, the World Cup in 2007 and a series against the British & Irish Lions in 2009.In between he had a career-threatening neck injury in 2006 that required a fusion of two vertebrae. By rights he should probably never have played again. After a near death experience from bacterial meningitis followed in 2013, he was told his career was over.But Burger does not know the meaning of the word quit.He is now a different player, more circumspect but no less brutal. He just chooses his moments more wisely...

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