One constant feature of the early competition was the custom of playing the two Semi finals and Final knockout format over a single weekend with entertainment and dancing in the evenings – the old Rugby Weekend had developed a raison d’etre; life of its own. Recognising that such concentrated effort would impose a significant strain on bone and muscle, not to mention the liver, the RFUK decreed that Semi-final matches should be of two 30-minute halves and the Final of two 35-minute halves. Extra time in the event of a draw was limited to 5-minutes each way and the Enterprise Cup was to be presented to the winning captain on the field of play immediately after no-side. The venue for these final ties was invariably Nairobi, guaranteeing a substantial number of paying spectators. Up-country sides often contested this decision, particularly since the Final was soon being played more or less routinely at Parklands Sports Club which had a long term arrangement with RFUK to host representative matches but was also the home ground of Nondescripts RFC.
In each of the first two years of inter-district competition the Cup was won by Nairobi District, drawing from the several clubs in and around the capital city where competent players were thick on the ground
[1]. The change of format to ‘club sides representing districts’ proved to be a great leveller and for the next five years Eldoret, representing the Plateau District of Western Kenya, won the cup.
The Eldoret XV was liberally sprinkled with the South African farmers who had transformed the rich soils of western Kenya into an agricultural powerhouse. The large, strong and deeply religious farmers of Eldoret carried all before them on the rugby field. Their domination stimulated the urban cunning of city-based clubmen who proposed that the next Final of the Enterprise Cup be played on a very wet Sunday. The Eldoret men were known to follow two religions, Christianity and Rugby Union, and they usually refused to turn out on the Lord’s Day. Desperate to profit from the inner conflict that a Sunday fixture could create, the smooth-tongued townies hastily assured the cautious farmers that the muddy morass that was the Parklands pitch had been ‘…exorcised and thus cleared by a higher authority for Sunday play.’ The match was played and the Lord’s side won anyway. Not until 1937 did Eldoret release their hold on the Enterprise Cup. In that year the semi finalists were Eldoret, Nondescripts, Nakuru and Northern Tanganyika (Arusha), the last two reaching this stage for the first time. The spread of competitive rugby for the first seven years of Enterprise Cup competition is revealed by the list of teams that competed in the earlier rounds – Ruiru, Thika, Muthaiga, Old Cambrians, Kitale, Kakamega, Nanyuki, Nyeri, Naivasha, Tanga, Mombasa, and Dar es Salaam. Several hundred spectators watched the Semi-finals and Finals, the latter reported as a splendid game, the best final seen for some years in which Nondescripts pipped Eldoret by 11 points to 4.
The same pattern continued into 1938, and in a mirror image of the previous year, the semi-finalists were Eldoret, Nakuru, Nondescripts and Northern Tanganyika. Nondescripts had scraped past Muthaiga in the Nairobi District final, a match that may have been the swansong for Muthaiga RFC, which slipped into a coma and subsequent oblivion soon afterwards. The Final was lively if one can believe the spectator who observed that ‘…the referee’s whistle had enough wind passed through it to start a typhoon.’ Nondescripts kept the trophy, beating Eldoret by 19 points to 9.
Uganda Kobs competed in the Enterprise Cup for the first time in 1939 and were denied a place in the Semi-finals only by Eldoret’s desperate defence, going down by 8 points to 6. Mombasa, Nondescripts and Nakuru were the other three semi-finalists. The Enterprise Cup was by now a significant social event in the Kenyan sporting calendar, well publicised in the press and on the radio, with spectators admitted at Shs2.00 per person. Some cynical observers suggested that ‘…it might be a good thing were Nondescripts to lose this year…’ and others that ‘…unless someone kidnaps Kotzenburg
[2] the cup is in his pocket.’ We must assume that the hunt for the kidnapper continues, for Eldoret beat Nondescripts and regained the trophy they had lost two years before.
Competitive rugby was suspended during the Second World War and the Enterprise Cup was locked away until 1947 when competition resumed. It was as if there had been no break at all. The Semi-finals on 2nd August 1947 saw Eldoret struggle past Nakuru whilst Nondescripts gained an easy victory over Mombasa. It was the fifth consecutive final between these two clubs and one cynic who saw Nondescripts play in the Semi-final noted that ‘…there was too much gallery play which might delight their vociferous dames on the touchline but it isn’t rugger. Against Eldoret today these parlour tricks will receive short shrift.’ And so they did, though to be fair, it was the referee who delivered the short shrift when he sent one off the Nondescript forwards from the field for foul play. The Western Kenya side retained the trophy with a victory by 12 points to 5 and this post-war rebirth of Enterprise Cup competition was rendered even more meaningful when Captain C.W. Hamley RN, formerly the Navigating Officer of HMS Enterprise, presented the trophy to the winning side.
The Nakuru side had impressed those who watched the 1947 semi-finals. It was said that their rugger was ‘…the stuff that will endure…and may Nakuru players know and play the game as it should be played – as a cavalry charge and not a Commando free-for all’. All perceptive stuff, for a new name appeared on the Cup after the competition of 1948, the first Nakuru victory. Normal service was resumed in 1949 when Nondescripts beat Eldoret in a close game at Parklands, continuing their winning ways in 1950 and 1951. The teams which had started the season in expectation of winning the Enterprise Cup included Nondescripts, Railway, Army, Old Cambrians, Ruiru/Thika (in Central Zone) Mackinnon Road, Mombasa, Northern Tanganyika (in Eastern Zone) and Kitale, Eldoret, Nakuru, Kericho and Uganda Kobs (in Western Zone). Club sides from all three countries of East Africa were now regularly competing in the Enterprise Cup.
Three years of Nondescript domination were enough to make the RFUK Committee exhume the rotting corpse of their Structural sub-committee and a new Provincial structure was imposed during 1952 and 1953. It surprised many when the Enterprise Cup left the Highlands in 1952, carried off by Coast Province. This was its one and only seaside holiday in 75 years and it was over very quickly, Western Kenya recapturing the trophy in 1953. The popularity of the new Provincial format may be gauged by the fact that this editor has been unable to locate any sensible comment on its success or otherwise. A concept without a defender, the new structure was abandoned in 1954 when the ‘club representing district’ format returned. Almost inevitably, the two finalists were Nondescripts and Eldoret, the result a victory for Nondescripts. It was a close game, the score 13 points to 6, and Eldoret was reduced to 14 men in the first minute of the match when their captain was injured. Incapacitating injuries were not unusual in the history of the Enterprise Cup and the neutral observer must wonder how the record might look had substitutions been permitted.
Injury was not the only malign event to influence the result of matches; the referees also had a role. One gentleman nursed throughout his life a feeling of injustice that was implanted when he crashed over for the try that would win his team a place in the Enterprise Cup Final, only to see the referee’s spectacles lying on the ground beside him and hear the blinded arbiter call out ‘Try unseen! Scrum five!’
Another referee to have influenced the outcome of an Enterprise Cup match was he who consumed a substantial dish of chilled dill tomatoes, washed down with ice-cold lager, as part of his pre-match preparation. His control of subsequent proceedings was somewhat marred by the length of time he spent lurking in the undergrowth, sowing next years tomato crop. Other referees have been accused of going to extremes, the two favourites being extreme antagonism to one or more players on the field and extreme ignorance of the Laws of the Game.
The administrative upheavals of 1952-54 presaged a redistribution of power in the land and neither Eldoret nor Nondescripts, previously part owners of the trophy, were to win the Enterprise Cup for sometime to come. The next decade saw several new names on the trophy, starting in 1955 with Kenya Harlequins. The Kenya Harlequin FC had been formed in 1952, mopping up sundry sporting types liberated by the demise of several army and Nairobi garrison sides. They became the tenants of the RFUEA; played their matches at the new Union ground and very rapidly became a force in Nairobi rugby, both on and off the field. Not for nothing did the pompous Chairman of much later RFUEA Committee point his rather patrician nose in the general direction of an argumentative Scottish wing-forward representing Kenya Harlequins and ask ‘Who is that long-haired young whippersnapper?’
The new Union ground was now the venue for the Enterprise Cup Final and this might be one reason why Kenya Harlequins expected to retain their hold on the Cup in 1956 when they again represented the Eastern Zone. This time they took the field against the surprise package of the year; the old Uganda RFC team now renamed Kampala RFC to avoid confusion with the recently formed Uganda RFU.
To the surprise of many, Kampala beat Kenya Harlequins by 14 points to 3 and the Enterprise Cup accompanied them back to Uganda. It was the first time that the trophy left Kenya but by no means the last. Kenya Harlequins regained the trophy in 1957, only to lose their grip on the Cup in 1958 when it was won by Nakuru, themselves experiencing a resurgence of enthusiasm for the game.
[1] No pun intended.
[2] It appears Kotzenburg was the biggest star in the Nondescript sky.
