Dan Vickerman says he drew on his experience playing alongside some of Australian rugby's greats to lead Cambridge to a 31-27 victory over Oxford at Twickenham on Thursday.

The former Wallabies lock drew praise after making the most of his one chance to captain the Light Blues in the traditional Varsity clash and avenging last year's 33-29 defeat, which he also played in.

"In my career, I've had the opportunity to learn from some seriously good players - George Gregan, Phil Waugh, Steve Larkham," Vickerman said.

"Hopefully you can pass on a bit of that knowledge to some of the younger guys."

The South African-born 30-year-old, capped 55 times for Australia between 2002-08, is midway through a three-year land economy course at the famous university.

He plans to feature in next year's 129th Varsity match, but players can only captain for one year.

"That's the unique thing about it, you get one opportunity to captain the side and you don't want to go out losing that one, so I'm just pretty happy we could put the best performance on and so down the track, when I'm old and grumpy, we had a win," he said.

Thursday's result, watched by 30,082 at Twickenham, meant Cambridge have won 61 times to Oxford's 53 with 14 draws.

Vickerman has said he would only consider the possibility of a return to the Wallabies once his studies end in June 2011.

Until then, he is content playing for the university, and rated his latest success highly.

"These sort of games epitomise why we play rugby, for the enjoyment," he said.

"It's an amateur game and everybody out there is putting their body on the line and enjoying what they're doing and I couldn't ask for any more.

"Rugby is about winning, no matter what level you play at, and for me, winning out there was pretty special."

Cambridge's South African fullback and man of the match, Jimmy Richards, described Vickerman as "somebody that everyone listens to".

"Dan has been absolutely brilliant," Richards said.

Cambridge coach Tony Rodgers agreed: "He brought that professionalism to the whole squad, to the whole team ... he's been an inspiration.

"He took no prisoners, basically. If things weren't right, he would let you know they weren't right in no uncertain terms. The guys have responded to him very well."

Oxford struggled for precision early, with numerous fumbles costing them while Cambridge defended strongly.

But it was Oxford who broke through with a penalty try just eight minutes from half-time and Ross Swanson's conversion gave them a 7-0 lead.

A Cambridge try moments before the break closed the gap to 7-5.

The tempo of the match picked up dramatically after the break with Cambridge scoring four tries to two, Oxford's second of the half a mere consolation in the closing seconds by Alex Cheesman.

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