Sea Of Tributes For South Africa’s ‘Black Pearl’ Chester Williams

Riyaz Patel

Tributes continue to pour in for Chester Williams, the only black player on South Africa’s famed 1995 Rugby World Cup winning team, who died Friday of a heart attack. He was 49.

“This was horrible news to wake up to this morning,” said Rassie Erasmus, director of rugby with the Springbok squad travelling in Japan.

 “There was a very sombre mood in the breakfast room, it really is unbelievable news,” he said.

“Chester Williams’s death at this tender age leaves all South Africans bereft of a rugby hero and national role model who still had a great deal to offer his sport and his country,” said President Cyril Ramaphosa.

Williams is an iconic figure in South African sport.

Although the famous World Cup win of 1995 came after the end of apartheid, rugby still held the perception of being a sport for the white population of South Africa.

Williams helped change