Earlier this year, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu walked away with the SA Rugby Young Player of the Year award for 2024, which was an obvious choice for the 23-year-old after his breakthrough season.
However, at times during his fledging career, there have been some questions asked about his temperament and hubris.
At one point during the 2024 Test season, Feinberg-Mngomezulu was given some tough love from Rassie Erasmus when the Springbok coach expressed disappointment that the playmaker had ‘hidden’ his knee injury due to a desire to keep playing against the All Blacks.
Feinberg-Mngomezulu has endured some injury struggles since then, but after recently returning to a frontline role for the Stormers, there was another incident not that long ago which the rising star admits “wasn’t one of his best moments”.
During the Stormers’s Round 14 URC match against Ulster, Feinberg-Mngomezulu was yellow carded for cynically taking out Rob Baloucoune in an off-the-ball challenge just before half-time, while also gesticulating for his opponent to get back up despite a clear shoulder barge.
Learning curve for Springbok, Stormers star Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu
Reflecting on that moment, Feinberg-Mngomezulu duly acknowledged he needed to walk on the right side of playing on the ‘edge’.
“I think I am well on the way there [to learning from those mistakes],” he told reporters. “My job for any team I play for is to move the needle forward and that wasn’t one of my best moments.
“But I like to play the game at 100% and sometimes I am going to be on the edge. Of course you don’t get that yellow card if you have played a perfect game on the edge so I know that it cost the team and it isn’t a good look for Stormers rugby.
“But I want to keep giving 100% for the team and just not make those little mistakes. I want to mature my game so I stay on the right side of yellow cards but at the same time I don’t want to change my game or my competitiveness for the team.”
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