Four South African referees, Quinton Immelman, Cwengile Jadezweni, Rasta Rasivhenge and Egon Seconds, have been nominated to take charge of the forthcoming Africa Gold Cup Test matches.

The four South African match officials will referee in the nine Tests between Kenya, Morocco, Namibia, Tunisia, Uganda and Zimbabwe from 16 June to 18 August. The matches will be played in Windhoek, Harare, Nairobi and Kampala.

Jadezweni has also been appointed to referee the Elgon Cup Test between Uganda and Kenya on Saturday, 26 May in Kampala.

Furthermore, four of South Africa’s best up-and-coming referees will be involved in two Sevens tournaments in the coming months.

Lusanda Mtiya and Ashleigh Murray will officiate in the Africa Women’s Sevens tournament in Gaborone (Botswana) on 26 and 27 May, while they will be joined by Paul Mente and Johre Botha in Swakopmund (Namibia) from 12 to 14 July for the World University Games Rugby Sevens tournament.

Jurie Roux, CEO of SA Rugby (www.SARugby.co.za), said: “We have a clear objective to assist with growing the game in the rest of Africa and by sending our best match officials to the various Tests and tournaments on the continent, and supporting the Rugby Africa by availing our top referees, we are fulfilling that objective.

“Our Referees Department recently hosted 10 match officials and referee coaches at a week-long workshop in Stellenbosch, where we assisted with various technical and high-performance concepts around refereeing.

“By taking hands with our African counterparts, and sending our referees to their countries, we also allow the unions to share information and ideas on best practice models, to further develop and grow the game in their own countries or rugby regions.”

Banks Yantolo, Referee Manager at SA Rugby, said the appointments are just reward for the hard work put in by these match officials, and show SA Rugby’s commitment to African rugby.

“Quinton, Cwengile, Rasta and Egon have picked up a lot of experience in the last season or two and all of them have refereed at Test level, in Tests in Africa, which helped with their development as top-class referees,” said Yantolo.

“By refereeing in the Gold Cup Africa tournament, which serves as qualification for the Rugby World Cup next year, they will get even more experience at a very high level, which bodes well for the future.

“And for Paul, Johre, Ashleigh and Lusanda to get some action in international sevens tournaments, is wonderful for their development as referees. We are expecting big things from all of them and we know they will make SA Rugby proud.”

Africa Gold Cup Test Appointments for SA referees: