In the race to become the best side in West Asia rugby, there is a good reason Dubai Hurricanes were able to outlast everyone else. Namely, Martin Mangwiro.
The Dubai club celebrated their 25th anniversary season by completing the UAE Premiership and West Asia Super Rugby double on Saturday night.
They did so in remarkable fashion. A week earlier, they had overturned a substantial deficit to beat Dubai Exiles to the domestic title.
Seven days later, they left their comeback even tighter to pinch the regional crown from Bahrain at the very last.
The touring side had won all 13 matches leading into Saturday’s final, and held the lead with two minutes left.
Then Mangwiro set off on yet another lung-bursting run from near his own line, offloaded at just the right time, leaving Toby Oakeley to score the try that won Hurricanes the title.
It was the second time he had made a vital impact on the match. In the first half, Bahrain had been dominant before Mangwiro made a 65-metre break up the middle of the field to get the Hurricanes their opening try.
To celebrate Oakeley’s winning score, Mangwiro then sprinted all the way back down the field even faster, wagging his finger at his clubmates who were on the sideline.
Meanwhile, everyone else was on their knees: the Bahrain players, broken with despair, the Hurricanes ones, spent with effort.
Mangwiro’s nickname is well earned. “A lot of people, and this is going all the way back to South Africa, called me the ‘Kenyan Runner’,” Mangwiro said.
“I never stop running. I am always busy, always active, and – as I always say – built different.”
It is fair to say Mangwiro, who also plays netball and ran a half-marathon in February, is built very different to the standard back row forward.
When he first turned up at the Hurricanes three years ago, the coaches thought he had got lost when he went to train with the forwards rather than the backs.
He was only training with them at all because of chance. He was new to the country from Johannesburg, and had messaged Mike Wernham, the club’s director of rugby, on Facebook to ask if he could come and try out.
“The message said, ‘I’m new from South Africa, I fancy playing some rugby, but I haven’t got any rugby shorts. Is there any chance I can come down?’” Wernham said.
“I said, ‘Yep, just bring any shorts you’ve got.’ He did his first training session in swimming shorts, and look at him now. He is arguably the best No 6 or 7 in the country. It is completely out of luck.”
There was a reason Mangwiro did not have any kit.
“My girlfriend at the time didn’t want me to play rugby, so she had thrown my boots and rugby stuff away,” Mangwiro said.
“I didn’t have any rugby shorts. I turned up for training at the Canes on my first day in swimming shorts and no rugby boots.
“As small as I am now, I was smaller then when I started with them. They split the backs and forwards, and I went with the forwards.
“They said, ‘Sorry, mate, the backline is over there.’ I said, ‘I’m actually a forward.’ That is how my journey started with them.”
Coincidentally, Mangwiro joined the club at around the same time as another loose forward from the same part of the world as him – Ruan Steenkamp.
In the time since, which has seen Hurricanes rise from the second tier of domestic rugby to the very top of West Asia, they have formed a formidable partnership in the back row.
The guy’s engine is absolutely insane. His heart is why every club knows him
Mike Wernham,
Hurricanes director of rugby
For example, it was Steenkamp who picked Bahrain’s pocket to set Mangwiro off and running for their opening try on Saturday night.
Steenkamp, now 32, had once captained a South Africa Under 20s side that included future World Cup winners like Cheslin Kolbe and Handre Pollard.
He also had an impressive professional career before moving to the UAE, but Mangwiro said he was blissfully unaware of all that before meeting him.
“I didn’t know who Ruan was at all,” Mangwiro said. “It was only from being part of the Hurricanes team and everyone saying, ‘That’s Ruan Steenkamp,’ that I did my research on him.
“I looked and thought, ‘Oh, wow. He’s a big shot.’ We’ve got used to each other playing side to side with each other over the past three years.
“I’ve got to know how he plays, how he works around the corner, and he understands that, ‘Martin will always be there; I can just throw the ball, and he’ll catch it and go’.”
Wernham says Mangwiro was an ideal addition to a Hurricanes side who were trying to lay the platform for success when he arrived back in 2022.
“The guy’s engine is absolutely insane,” Wernham said. “His heart is why every club knows him. He is such a loveable guy, and he is absolutely loved by us.
“Since he arrived, we have supported him, helped him out here and there by finding him a job, and he loves this country.
“He also loves this club, and we are very happy to have him. That is just how life works sometimes.”
The recruitment of the likes of Mangwiro and Steenkamp, not to mention coaching staff of the calibre of Henry Paul and Evan Buekes, has fast-forwarded the club’s grand ambitions.
Wernham said he had a five-year plan to reach the West Asia Super Rugby final. They won it within three.
“There are some lads that were with us when we were down in Div 1 who have just stuck to it,” Wernham said.
“They have believed in the process and the club. I have been trying to do this for nine years now, and this is the first time we have made the final, let alone won it.
“We had a chance when Covid hit. Whether we would have won I don’t know. We just had such confidence in this team because they are a squad with so much love and brotherhood that surrounds them. They are a credit to the club.”
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Fly from Dubai or Abu Dhabi to Chiang Mai in Thailand, via Bangkok, before taking a five-hour bus ride across the Laos border to Huay Xai. The land border crossing at Huay Xai is a well-trodden route, meaning entry is swift, though travellers should be aware of visa requirements for both countries.
Flights from Dubai start at Dh4,000 return with Emirates, while Etihad flights from Abu Dhabi start at Dh2,000. Local buses can be booked in Chiang Mai from around Dh50
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