Two recent articles by Rob Houwing left me quite irked to say the least. In the first one he bragg about the strength of South African rugby with three sides reaching the play-offs of this year’s S15. He writes: “Whatever happens in the remaining three weekends of knockout fare in Super Rugby, South African rugby has affirmed its well-being by effectively having dominated the lion’s share of the 2012 competition.
…. this season is the first to be fairly obviously bossed by one nation … and that honour falls this country’s way as all of the overall log-winning Stormers plus Bulls and Sharks have made it through the six-team funnel.
…. at the end of it all South Africans were broadly entitled to a degree of smug satisfaction.”
In the second article he writes that history seems to indicate that the team that end on top of the log normally wins the competition. Sort of suggesting that the Stormers now fall in that category.
I must admit that I was and still are a bit irked with the arrogant trend of those two articles. Firtsly, the Stormers can consider themselves very lucky to top the log. The Chiefs suffererd two horrible last minute defeats in their last two games. In the Crusaders game Sonny Bill butchered a certain try by going on his own and against the Hurricanes the TMO allowed a try (after time) that no other TMO in S15 would probably allow. So in fairness the Chiefs should sit at the top of the log.
Secondly, I remember so clearly the 2010 season with the Bulls and Stormers playing in the final. The Bulls have humiliated the Chiefs in the semi’s at Loftus and SA rugby looked invincible.
In the run-up to the first tri-nation match of the 2010 season the Springbok players revealed in the media that they’ve been talking among themselves about being the best Springboks side ever. I can also remember the body language of the Springbok players as they warmed-up for that first tri-nations test against the All Blacks. There was chip on the shoulder attitude and a swagger in their walk as they went through their drills.
What happened in that test match is history. We got a rugby lesson. Bakkies Botha was yellow carded for head butting Cowan and we were comprehensively outplayed at the breakdowns. Peter de Villiers with just a hint of a catch in his voice said during the post-match interview: “It’s not a train smash. We will re-group and will be ready next Saturday for the second test.” In the end it was a train smash because we lost that test and the one after that against Aussie and then went on and lost against New Zealand in Soweto and against Australia on the Highveld (the first time since 1963).
Frans Ludeke probably said best what I want to say about Houwing’s bragging.
On asked how he felt about traveling to NZ to take on the Crusaders in the S15 playoffs Ludeke said:
“All that happened through the season is now irrelevant,”
I totally agree with that sentiment and it also applies to the oncoming test matches. Whatever happened so far this season counts for nothing when it comes to the 4 nations. Regarding the rest of the S15 tournament and the four nations consider the following remarks by Ludeke:
“It is about teams that can handle the pressure – it doesn’t matter if you play home or away.
“We’ve shown that we can travel and we need to focus on our own game plan and we need to be accurate.”
There certainly is a number of new talented players in the South Africa teams but the real challenge is whether this talent can be gelled into a national unit and whether that team can then strategically out think and outfox the opposition. I have more hope with Heyneke Meyer in charge but the All Blacks are not England and the Wallabies always pose a different challenge requiring shrewed tactics and clinicalness in delivery.
The Bulls did not impress in the scrums on the weekend against the Lions. The Stormers backline play and general ability to create tries is suspect. In playoffs and test matches one mistake (very probable with newbies in the test team) can see you in a situation where you need to score tries. Who will forget that disastrous RWC quarter-final when we ran for 80 minutes against a brick wall of Aussie defense (a defense demolished by the Irish a few weeks earlier and by the All Blacks the next week) and not able to crack it and score.
The Sharks play the Reds without Lambie and Frans Steyn and I’ll be surprised if they win that one. I also cannot see the Bulls scrum matching up to the Crusaders in the set piece.
In short I have my doubts that the SA teams with all their talent is going to be clinical enough to win the S15 and the four nations this year.
Let’s stop gloating and start to take a real serious look at SA rugby and we might find we’re there and there about but still lacking that strategic and clinical all roundness to call ourselves the best in the world.
In conclusion, I totally understand where Houwing is comming from. It certainly is pleasing to see three SA sides in the playoffs but in the final analyses I don’t think many people are going to remember in 5 years time how many SA teams made it into the playoffs. What they are going to remember is who won the S15 and who won the tri-nations.
Now is not the time to gloat. Now is the time to get real worried and focussed if any of the three SA franchises wants to play in the final; let alone win it. If we want SA rugby to improve we need to disect results, tournaments and matches a bit more. We need to start focusing on the things that will make a difference towards beating the All Blacks more frequently.
I think you spot on mate.The Bulls will indeed be lucky if they win against the Crusaders. The Stormers can’t afford to play conservative rugby anymore, they should use the backline they have.As for the Sharks, I never wanted the coach to Start Lambie, rather use him from the bench, Ludik has been the inform Fullback from all the teams imo, but time will tell. Should the Sharks truimph, they will have to travel back to Cape Town…and that travelling alone will be a huge stumbling block.
silly comment…this is playoffs, why would any team hange their strategy that saw them top the overall log, win the most matches, etc?? really
there is a trend in with south africans to focus on our negatives and dwell on what we are doing wrong while failing to acknowledge what we are doing right. it is why we can never celebrate our accomplishments. i mean we won the 2007 RWC and still the public cheapened it by saying we didn’t play Aus or NZ. i think it’s importamt to take a sober look at our performances but if we are to dwell on anything it should be the positive.
That’s fine (celebrating our accomplishments) but we also have a tendency to over rate those accomplishments and not to make an honest analyses of the situation.
Most of all there is a time to celebrate and a time to stay focussed. We have not won anything yet and 2010 was a massive reality check. S15 is not test rugby and even though three teams in the play-offs are great it is no guarantee of success in either the play-offs or the four nations.
It is the wrong time to start patting each other on the back. I’ll never forget that swagger in 2010 during the warm-up for the first tri-nations test and how it backfired on us.
I totally agree this gloating means nothing.I can’t see the Bulls and Sharks reaching the semi’s and the Stormers meeting the Crusaders they have one hellava game to defend and the only way to win that game is to have ball in hand and attack. The Stormers front line will also be no match for the Crusaders.
As an outsider I get the impression saffers are a bit like Kiwis when it comes to rugby and confidence – sometimes we indulge in an arrogant dismissal of the opposition (and I know the NZ sports media is a national embarrassment in that regards – they don’t speak for all Kiwis).
At our best, like you, we have a quiet but understated optimism. Aussies in comparison are all mouth and bluster, no matter what the sport or situation. Kiwis in contrast tend to be a pessimistic people, but rugby is our one point of optimism and unity. Saffer dynamics seem a lot more complex on that point, due no doubt to your interesting history and current politics! (I’m not making the rules – just reporting them!).
Despite our pessimism, no Kiwi ever believes the All Blacks should lose, although it will often be tough. Any player who doesn’t have that self-belief should ever make it through the NZ system to the highest level. Instead, people with that mentality play for our cricket team!
But you are right – knock out is a whole new world! There are still people in NZ saying the All Blacks choked by winning the RWC 2011 final against France by only 1 point. They have no idea what they are talking about. The team I manage just won a 1/4 final yesterday by 2 point in the last 4 minutes against a team they beat by thirty a few months ago. We have two more weeks of the roller-coaster. It is great, but requires a revised and fresh mental approach. Essential game plans remain the same, but the psychology, and dealing with mental pressure/making the right decisions needs much more attention. If you have major technical deficiencies, it is probably too late to paper over those cracks. Instead, you have to rely on the “luck”/seizing your opportunities that especially decide knock-out games.
Which is why the Crusaders, for all their current faults and lack of precision compared to teams of old, are so dangerous at this stage. They have been there before, they have the old heads to soak up the pressure, and the tried-and-true systems…
Crusaders certainly know when and how to peak. Outstaning performance by the Saders over the weekend. The bulls are getting a lot of flack at the moment in SA due to their lackluster performance.
In fairness the Crusaders played really well and rattled the Bulls upfront (which was surprising). Most importantly Morné Steyn was exposed as a player that can’t dictate when the going gets tough.
Hougaard just don’t have the same ability as Fourie du Preez to change the course of a match or to bring his struggling pack back into the match.
I also see a certain amount of ‘gavolheid’ (gutfullness) with the kick and chase rugby of the bulls (and the Springboks) among SA supporters.
Personally I had enough of it (up and under high school rugby) and seriously will stop watching the Springboks play if they persist with that style of rugby.
The Stormers in my mind is only marginally different from the Bulls. They don’t kick and chase but they have a defensive mindset that also prevents them from playing constructive rugby.