Some players collect caps. Liebenberg collected captaincies. School, province, country, an English giant, and now the union that made him — every coach who has worked with him has ended up putting the armband on his arm, and not one of them has regretted it.
Hanro Liebenberg was born on 10 October 1995 in Brackenfell, outside Cape Town, and turns 31 today. He is 1.97m and 110kg. He made his name in the No 8 jersey for the Blue Bulls and the Junior Springboks, and he has since done the job at 6, at 7, and at lock. He carries, he jumps in the lineout, and he does the work in the tight channels that nobody applauds.
HTS DROSTDY, WORCESTER, AND THE SECOND LIEBENBERG
He grew up in the Boland and went to school at HTS Drostdy in Worcester, the same school his older brother Wiaan attended. That mattered more than most sibling comparisons do. Wiaan captained the Junior Springboks in 2012 and led them to South Africa’s first Junior World Championship title.
So Hanro arrived in age-group rugby already being measured against someone. He answered it the way he has answered everything since, by doing the work and saying very little about it.
In 2013, fresh from Craven Week trials, he captained HTS Drostdy in their Classic Clash against Worcester Gimnasium. In the same final school year he captained Boland at Craven Week and scored two tries against hosts Limpopo Blue Bulls in Polokwane. He was picked for Boland at Under-18 level twice.
From there it was north to Pretoria. He played for the Blue Bulls Under-19s in the 2014 Under-19 Provincial Championship, and by early 2015 he was in the Bulls’ 55-man Super Rugby training group.
“What a Rugby CV! He’s only 31 years old and still the first man any coach would grab in his position! His time at the Bulls and Leicester, and now back at Loftus, has made him a top contender! He truly is made of steel when you watch him play. Fearless!” – 🎙️Jay
CALVISANO 2015: THE CAPTAIN WHO TOPPED THE TABLE
In May 2015, SARU confirmed that the Blue Bulls No 8 would skipper the 28-man Junior Springbok squad at the World Rugby Under-20 Championship in Italy. He had already led the side to a win over the Varsity Cup Dream Team and a 2-0 series sweep of Argentina Under-20 in Rosario.
Dawie Theron’s squad included Thomas du Toit, Jean-Luc du Preez, Warrick Gelant, RG Snyman, Ox Nche and Joseph Dweba. Hanro Liebenberg captained the lot of them at 19.
They were ruthless in Pool B at Calvisano. He scored in the 33-5 opening win over hosts Italy, then came bonus-point wins over Samoa and Australia 46-13, and the best pool record in the tournament.
Then England again. The Junior Boks lost the semi-final 28-20, knocked out by the same opponent for the second year running. He started the third-place play-off three days later and South Africa beat France 31-18 for bronze. Five matches, two tries, one tournament he has never pretended was the one he wanted.
CURRIE CUP CAPTAIN, SUPER RUGBY CAPTAIN AT 21, AND A WINTER IN PARIS
He made his Bulls debut at 19 and finished with 44 Super Rugby appearances and eight tries between 2015 and 2019, alongside 20 games for the Blue Bulls in the Currie Cup.
In May 2017 the Bulls were in freefall. Coach Nollis Marais stripped the side back, dropped senior men including former Springbok captain Adriaan Strauss, and handed the captaincy to a 21-year-old ahead of the Highlanders match at Loftus. He was reported at the time as the youngest Bulls captain in Super Rugby history. It was a job nobody sensible wanted, and injury later cut that season short.
He was made Blue Bulls Currie Cup captain under Pote Human the following year and took the side to the semi-finals. In October 2018 the union released him, lock Hendré Stassen and scrumhalf André Warner to Stade Français on short-term loans, where Heyneke Meyer was in charge in Paris alongside John McFarland. He played five Top 14 matches over December and January and was back in Pretoria in time for Super Rugby.
WELFORD ROAD: 152 GAMES AND THE SAME TROPHY AS MARTIN JOHNSON
In 2019 he left at 23. He told Leicester Tigers he had been inside the South African system since school and wanted to challenge himself. Geordan Murphy signed him; Leicester’s own club website later described the fan-favourite status he built at Welford Road for his no-nonsense style of play and his tough approach to the game.
The first season punished him. He debuted on 27 September 2019 in a Premiership Rugby Cup match against Exeter, lost the middle of the campaign to ankle surgery, and came back to finish with 15 appearances at flanker and No 8.
Then it turned. In the 2020/21 season, under Steve Borthwick, he was voted Leicester Tigers Supporters’ Player of the Year, an award previously won by Martin Johnson, Neil Back, Martin Corry, Geordan Murphy and George Ford. Borthwick called him an all-round rugby player who carries well, defends well and is strong at the set piece.
He was made vice-captain in August 2021. In the Premiership final the following June he scored the first try and secured the final kick-off as Leicester beat Saracens 15-12 at Twickenham.
Then came the history. Appointed Leicester club captain for 2022/23, he became the first South African and only the second non-English skipper in more than half a century at the club, following Ed Slater, Tom Youngs and Ellis Genge. He made his 100th appearance on 18 February 2024, captaining the side to a 29-21 Premiership Cup semi-final win away at Ealing Trailfinders, with 32 of those caps already as skipper.
He scored seven tries in 23 games in 2024/25. He left England with 152 appearances, 31 tries and 165 points, and in his final months he packed down at lock for the first time since 2019 because the club had injuries there. No fuss about that either. He said the position was growing on him.
THE BOK CAP THAT NEVER CAME
He has never played a Test for the Springboks. He came close to a call-up in 2017, in the years when he was one of the most consistent loose forwards in the country, and the moment passed. Seven years in England put him further outside the conversation.
It is the one line on his record that looks like a gap, and it says more about timing and the depth of South African loose forward stocks than it does about the player. Men who do not get capped do not captain Leicester Tigers, and they do not get bought back by the Bulls on a three-year deal at 30.
BACK AT LOFTUS, WITH DANIELLE AND LUCAH
The homecoming was confirmed in March, and he was blunt about it. He told the Bulls it was one of the toughest decisions of his career because of how much he loved Leicester, but that the pull of home and the chance to represent the Bulls again was something he could not ignore. Perspective changes, he said, when children are involved.
Blue Bulls Company CEO Edgar Rathbone built the announcement around exactly that, welcoming Hanro, his wife Danielle and their son Lucah back to Loftus and calling him a man who understands the DNA of the union.
He pulled the blue jersey back on against the All Blacks at Loftus in August, wearing No 7 outside Marcell Coetzee. It took barely two months for Johan Ackermann to hand him the Bulls captaincy for the Jukskei derby against the Lions, with Coetzee out injured. Bulls captain Hanro Liebenberg, eleven years after Calvisano, nine years after Nollis Marais gambled on a 21-year-old. Same armband, same hard, unglamorous player.
Happy 31st Birthday, Hanro. From all of us at Just Plain Sport — the Loftus crowd that watched you leave as a boy got the man back, and they know exactly what they have.
