Blast from the past: Lucky 13 for Gary Player at SA Open

Today in SA sports history: December 6

1931 — SA’s cricketers get their first taste of Australian great Don Bradman as they crash to defeat in the first Test in Brisbane by an innings and 163 runs. Bradman scored 226 in the home team’s total of 450. The tourists were bowled out for 170 and 117, Bruce Mitchell top-scoring with 58 in SA’s first innings. 

1955 — Jake Tuli’s bid to regain his Empire flyweight crown from Dai Dower ends in defeat after 15 rounds in London. But he gave the Welsh champion hell in the early rounds, cutting both his eyes and then dropping him in the fourth round. Tuli, having lost six of his last 10 bouts at that stage, quit the ring to seek a normal life in Britain. But he made a comeback nearly two years later after failing to find suitable work in Britain. He had wanted a job in printing, where he had served a six-year apprenticeship at home, but the union in SA didn’t give him the credentials he needed to work in England. The married father-of-three was doing a graveyard shift at a cable factory instead. Tuli lost his three comeback fights and retired again, but made two more comebacks before retiring for good in 1967.

1956 — Four teenage girls combine to win Olympic bronze for SA in the women’s 4x100m freestyle relay at the Melbourne Games. Natalie “Toy” Myburgh — the team’s strongest swimmer who had finished eighth in the women’s 100m freestyle final a few days earlier — delivered a strong final leg as she took SA from fourth place to third, making up four yards on her German rival. Jenny Myburgh (no relation) had gone off first, bringing SA home in fourth before Sue Roberts pulled them up to third. Mo Abernethy, a backstroker, was pushed back into fourth spot before Toy produced her fireworks. On the same day, cyclist Alfred Swift, a draughtsman on the SA Railways, caused a major shock when he took bronze in the 1,000m time trial. Swift had won a silver in the 4,000m at the 1952 Olympics. That was the last time SA won an Olympic cycling medal. And the relay bronze was SA’s last Olympic swimming medal until Penny Heyns at Atlanta 1996. Jenny, just 16 at the time, moved to Johannesburg to train for the Games because Hillbrow was the only heated facility in the country, staying with the Roberts family. Previously she had been based at the Sea Point pavilion where she had to dodge other pool-goers during training sessions. 

1969 — The Springboks lose to Scotland 3-6 at Murrayfield in Edinburgh. Flyhalf Piet Visagie landed a penalty for SA, while fullback Ian Smith scored a try and kicked a penalty for the home side. It was the first Test of what would be an underwhelming end-of-year tour.

1981 — Gary Player wins his 13th and final SA Open title at the Royal Johannesburg Golf Club, a quarter of a century after claiming his first crown in 1956. But he was given four lives from runner-up John Bland, who missed four separate putts to win the tournament. The two of them contested an 18-hole play-off, in which they both scored 70, before Player clinched the victory on the third extra hole. That remains the most number of wins by a single golfer, four more than Bobby Locke’s nine triumphs from 1935 to 1955. Sid Brews won eight from 1925 to 1952.

1997 — The Springboks score 10 tries as they hammer Scotland 68-10 at Murrayfield. Fullback Percy Montgomery and wing James Small scored two tries each, with flank Rassie Erasmus, wing Pieter Rossouw, replacement flyhalf Franco Smith, centre Andre Snyman, captain Gary Teichmann and flank Andre Venter also getting in on the action. It surpassed the 44-0 hiding of the Scots dished out in 1951, when SA crossed for nine tries.

2003 — SA champion Earl Morais is stopped in the first round by Welshman Enzo Maccarinelli for the WBU cruiserweight title in Cardiff.

2013 — Simphiwe Vetyeka pulls off a surprise win when he stops Chris John of Indonesia in the sixth round in Perth to add the WBA featherweight crown to his IBO title.

2020 — The first ODI between SA and England in Paarl is cancelled because of Covid-19 fears. The three-match series was later cancelled.