Both All Blacks And Springboks when they meet in the final on Saturday, they will be attempting to become the first nation to win the Rugby World Cup for the fourth time.
The game in Paris will be the second final between the two countries; South Africa won the first in Johannesburg in 1995, with a Joel Stransky drop-goal in extra time securing an unforgettable victory that helped unite the country.
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The two countries have a rich and historic rugby history and rivalry, which is going to be added to.
“We’re frontier-type societies; one is a tiny bunch of islands on the other side of the world, and the other is a little spot on the end of Africa,” former South African international Bobby Skinstad explained on the Rugby Union Daily podcast.
“One of the colonial influences was this game they gave to us that we’ve embraced and been able to beat the colonial powers at their own game.”
South Africa hosted the Rugby World Cup for the first time in 1995, following a sporting ban that prohibited them from competing in the first two editions.
All Blacks advanced to the final thanks to four tries by Jonah Lomu in their semi-final victory over England and were considered favorites with Lomu in almost unstoppable form.
There were no tries in the final, with Stransky and Andrew Mehrtens trading three penalties and a drop-goal each before the final whistle.
The game went into overtime, when a drop-goal by Stransky secured the Webb Ellis Cup.
Mehrtens was one of several All Blacks players who fell ill in the run-up to the final, but he claims the squad was totally fit by the time the game began, and he refuses to blame a stymied preparation for their defeat.
“The determining factor for us not winning that final was South Africa tackled us where other teams hadn’t,” he said.
“They delighted in getting up on Jonah. There was the famous tackle from Joost van der Westhuizen when Jonah had broken through off a line-out.
“They knocked us over where other teams hadn’t. We couldn’t play the game that had been so successful for us throughout the tournament.”
Former political prisoner turned unifying president of a country Nelson Mandela presented the trophy to captain Francois Pienaar while sporting a South Africa rugby shirt bearing the Springbok badge, a design that was formerly despised by non-whites in the nation due to its close ties to the apartheid era.
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“It was only afterwards that you started seeing [how big it was for South Africa],” Mehrtens added. “We’d met Mandela before the match, which was a huge moment.
“I remember having conflicting thoughts in my head; I thought this was something I’d remember for the rest of my life, having met an iconic, historical figure who is so revered around the world, but at the same time in two minutes’ time I’ve got to do a kick-off that I’ve got to make sure goes 10 metres.”
