There’s no rugby rivalry in the Potter household, despite one person born in South Africa and the other New Zealand.

Bruce and Marg both now support the All Blacks after he received his citizenship back in the early 2000s, but that intense 1995 game against the Springboks was a different story.

“We had one couch each. I thought New Zealand was going to win it,” Marg said.

But, then came that drop goal by Joel Stransky in overtime that changed the whole match. And Bruce said Marg just went quiet. For days. He, naturally was ecstatic.

It was even more special that Bruce had known Stransky personally, a friend of his brothers, along with former Springbok Wahl Bartmann who he’d trained with in the Army.

Bruce moved to New Zealand in 1988 after playing club rugby himself back in the day.

Starting out as wing, he then moved into the forwards as a prop, where he said he had way more fun.

Marg has always been sports mad. Originally from Auckland, she hopes Sunday’s World Cup match will have more beef in it than the last 15-13 final between the two countries.

“It was too close and I need this one to be a blow out in the other direction.”

Bruce thinks it will be a high scoring game with lots of good running.

Sunday morning will be a real family affair. Local South African friends are coming over and they also have a new border living with them who is South African too.

Marg will put on a full cooked breakfast at half time, “because everyone will still be happy then.”

They’re watching the game on a big projector in the lounge of their Bridge Hill house, and will serve boerewors to guests (South African sausage).

Out of the 105 games the two countries have played against each other, New Zealand has won 62 times and South Africa 39. But, they’ve both only held the Webb Ellis Cup three times a piece.

Aurora Energy has a planned outage on Sunday, but has delayed works to ensure people can still watch the game.