After winning a Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series that tested their stress levels to the limits, the Springboks deserve a bit of down time and they reportedly got that at the weekend as they let their hair down a bit in Terrigal, north of Sydney.
The Boks stopped over in Sydney after the long flight from the United States, where they made sure they laid sole claim to the inaugural RGR trophy with a 43-28 win over the All Blacks in Baltimore last weekend, and will only move on to Perth on Thursday ahead of Sunday’s game at the Optus Stadium.
But while the Boks have had some down time in among the training they’ve done, there is nothing casual about their approach to a game against the Wallabies that will bring to a close their southern hemisphere international season, one that has seen them win six out of seven games, including three against the next best team in the world.
Apart from the memory of what happened last year at Ellis Park, where the Wallabies scored 38 unanswered points in winning 38-22 in a Rugby Championship game, still being fresh, this game is also an important post-RGR stepping stone as the Boks move on from the year’s big event and towards the next challenge.
The next stop for the Boks is Europe in November, where if they are taking the Nations Championship seriously they may need to score some emphatic wins against good teams if they are to keep up with the All Blacks, who have the easier November schedule.
They do play England and Scotland, but the Boks will be away to France and Ireland in successive weeks and points difference will decide the finalists if there is a tie. In the Nations Championship there are two groups divided by hemisphere.
Sunday’s game should see the Boks field a team similar to the one they would probably have selected for the second test of the RGR series in Cape Town were it not for their disappointing loss and wake-up call in the first test.
After that, instead of rotating selections, Erasmus kept pretty much to the core of the same team, but there will be at least two significant changes for Sunday’s game. Pieter-Steph du Toit and Damian de Allende, two constants in the big games this year, have flown home to spend time with their families.
With Ben-Jason Dixon at the Stormers currently and having his readiness for the opening Vodacom URC match against Connacht in Galway on Friday night assessed in the early part of this week, it will be interesting to see what coach Rassie Erasmus does when it comes to filling the No 7 jersey normally worn by the twice World Rugby Player of the Year, Du Toit.
Dixon did not fly to the USA after the third RGR test in Soweto because he was struggling to get through concussion protocols, something that Stormers coach John Dobson said he was working on after linking back up with his club team.
Franco Mostert has played blindside flank for the Boks before and could be in the mix to start in Perth, or Erasmus could look at another option such as Elrigh Louw or even Cameron Hanekom (he wore the No 7 against England).
When it comes to De Allende’s position of inside centre, Erasmus has a few options. Moving fullback Damian Willemse there, as he was in the big win over the All Blacks in Wellington last year, could add an exciting attacking dynamic at the back. But Erasmus may feel his hybrid player, Andre Esterhuizen, deserves a run in his more regular position.
Then there’s Handre Pollard. There appears to be an expectation that the two time World Cup winner will start at flyhalf, but he has also trained and played occasionally in the midfield this year.
After five games in a row in the No 10 jersey, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu may be in need of a rest, although there is also merit in giving him as many opportunities in the position as it is possible to give him in order to grow the first choice pivot into the role he should fill in next year’s World Cup.
Of course the World Cup is being played in Australia, which cues one of the reasons Erasmus says there is going to be nothing casual about this last week of the southern hemisphere phase of the international season.
“This is a test match against a country we have had a strong rivalry with for as long as I can remember,” said Erasmus from Sydney.
“It’s not a tour we want to finish off casually. This is a great country and the World Cup is being hosted here next year. So it is massive to be able to play against the World Cup hosts in a big test match. They will be really fresh and they’ve just won four of their last five matches, while we come off a tough series against New Zealand.
“But RGR and this match have nothing to do with each other. This is a completely different challenge,” he added.
The extent to which it will be a different challenge will be known to us on Tuesday. That is when the Bok team for the Perth game will be announced. If Erasmus makes a radical shift, which he may well do, he may have a fresh and exciting team ready for action on Sunday but with it will come the risk implicit in a team not having played together for a while.
THIS WEEK’S TEST MATCH
Sunday, 27 September - Australia v South Africa (Optus Stadium, Perth)
Kick-off: 11:30am SA time.