Francois Hougaard is a professional South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n rugby union

Rugby union

Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 rugby player. His primary position is scrumhalf, but in recent times he has been deployed on the wing for the Bulls

Bulls (rugby franchise)

The Bulls, for sponsorship reasons known as the Vodacom Bulls, are a South African rugby union team competing in the Super Rugby competition. They are based in Pretoria and play their home matches at Loftus Versfeld...

. He was born in Paarl

Paarl

Paarl is a town with 191,013 inhabitants in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Its the third oldest European settlement in the Republic of South Africa and the largest town in the Cape Winelands. Due to the growth of the Mbekweni township, it is now a de facto urban unit with Wellington...

, South Africa and his first tour with the Springboks was to France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

 and England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 in late 2009 where he played in one test against Italy on 21 November 2009 and two touring matches.
Hougaard won the Currie Cup in 2009, and the Super rugby title in 2010, scoring tries in both finals.

In the 2011 Super 15 season, he showed great promise, adapting to his self proclaimed preferred position of scrum half in the absences of Fourie Du Preez, very well, and as a result, landed a position in the Springbok World Cup Squad for 2011 tournament. He played for Paul Roos Gymnasium.

External links

• Francois Hougaard from SARugby