Boks started ineptly but there’s no need for long lasting depression

The gnashing of teeth and the negative feeling that has followed the Springbok defeat to New Zealand in Auckland was not out of place. Every test match is important, and the attitude that everything is about the Rugby World Cup undermines international rugby. It can’t all just be about a global event that takes place just every four years and lasts just six weeks.

It is because it is only the World Cup that seems to matter anymore when it comes to the 50 over format in cricket that most ODI series, with the exception of the 438 game in 2006 and that just because it was so freaky, are so forgettable. They tend to be played under-strength as preparation for something else.

But now that the weekend where the Boks effectively surrendered hope of winning the Castle Lager Rugby Championship as a prelude to their quest to retain the World Cup they won in Japan in 2019 is over, it is time to look forward. And to assess where the Boks are in relation to their quest for another taste of winning rugby’s equivalent of the Holy Grail.

It was the Bok intent to win the Rugby Championship so they should be disappointed they didn’t win in Auckland. But here’s a question: Who won the Rugby Championship in 2011 and 2015? Clue: It wasn’t the team that won the World Cup in those two years, meaning New Zealand. That so few remember that, which I assume to be the case, illustrates a point.

As a point of accuracy, there wasn’t a Rugby Championship in 2011. It was actually the Tri-Nations that the Wallabies won that year because it was before Argentina joined the SANZAAR competition. That happened in 2012. So it was the Tri-Nations that the All Blacks won in 2007, when they were blown out of the World Cup by France in the quarterfinal and the Boks won the global prize.

The Bok coach of that time, Jake White, used the Tri-Nations as a stepping stone to the World Cup, no more. He didn’t send his top players on the Antipodean leg of the SANZAAR competition. The World Cup winning captain John Smit wasn’t there, a second string team played with Johan Muller and Bob Skinstad, neither of whom played in the big games at the World Cup, captaining.

NOT SO DIFFERENT TO 2019

The only outlier when it comes to the trend of Rugby Champs/Tri-Nations not being relevant to the World Cup was 2019, when the Boks won. But go back and watch the video of their game against the All Blacks in Wellington (yes both years the Boks drew the Kiwis away) and pay particular attention to the first half hour. The New Zealanders were all over the South Africans then too.

It was only late in the game that they started to come back. Much like Saturday. The difference being that in 2019 the breaks went their way. This time they didn’t. So in 2019 the Boks escaped with a draw that really should have been a defeat. They then lost to the All Blacks in the opening World Cup game, but then went on to win the World Cup.

Make no mistake, much of the Bok play in the first 20 minutes at Mount Smart Stadium was lamentable. It was how inept they were that got everyone venting their spleens on social media. But it was only 20 minutes, and changing a whole team based on 20 minutes where there was inevitable rust given the disparity in the recent game exposure between the South African players and New Zealand players, like some are calling for, is overreaction.

LE ROUX IS A CONCERN

Maybe in some areas there should be concern. Ironically, one of the players who was battle hardened by having played at Loftus the previous week, Willie le Roux, was probably the worst player on the field for the Boks in that disastrous opening quarter. He was awful in the aerial battle and his ineffectual tackle attempt (was there an attempt?) in the buildup to the one All Black try was so Mike Catt. The difference being that he wasn’t trying to tackle Jonah Lomu.

The reason Le Roux is playing on after the World Cup is apparently so he can reach 100 Bok caps. But that shouldn’t be allowed to happen. It is time to move on at the start of the next World Cup cycle to the man who will replace Le Roux in the last line of defence. And maybe that should be done now. Damian Willemse isn’t an international flyhalf. But he might be a very good international fullback.

BOKS ARE FINDING THINGS OUT

And that surely is really what this stage of the international season building up to the World Cup should really be about: finding out things. South African fans aren’t in the position that New Zealand fans are in. The Kiwi fans know about the form their players carried into the international season as they all play Super Rugby. With us lot it is different - who watches the Japan leagues??So when Damian de Allende knocked on a ball in that first 20 minutes with no-one around him creating pressure, was it symptomatic of his current form? We don’t know. And talking of Super Rugby, it wasn’t just because the bulk of the All Black team that beat Argentina seven days earlier that the hosts had the early advantage in sharpness at Mount Smart, all the Kiwi players have played competition rugby until much more recently than most of the South Africans.

Super Rugby Pacific only ended two weeks ago. The Vodacom United Rugby Championship ended seven weeks ago. The players playing in Japan hadn’t played since the end of April. The Bok skipper for the day, Eben Etzebeth, hadn’t played since he was injured in early April.

Playing the All Blacks in your first game in months is one heck of a place to restart. It only ever happens in a World Cup year that you hit New Zealand so early, and it was only the first game for so many of the starting Boks in Auckland because of the selection policy that was geared around the dual need to give all squad players game time and combat the travel challenge inherent in playing in New Zealand seven days after playing in South Africa.

THERE WAS RUST IN PRETORIA TOO

If the winning of the Rugby Championship is the imperative, the All Blacks got their selection right this time. The All Blacks were more battle hardened, and it showed in that furious opening 20 minute onslaught, where clearly they targeted the Bok rust. And rust there was aplenty, and understandably so for players who were playing their first international game of the year.

On the subject of rust, it wasn’t the first time this season the Boks were rusty either. There was plenty of rust the previous week in Pretoria, the difference being that the South Africans were on that occasion playing at altitude at a venue where Australian rugby players, and possibly coaches too, fall over in a quivering heap of nervous human blubber.

That’s not to say that the Boks weren’t good in Pretoria. They were excellent overall. And it is when you twin that performance with the one in Auckland that you can arrive at the conclusion that the Boks are not in a bad space when it comes to the build-up to the World Cup, which kicks off in France two months from now.

COVER IN MOST AREAS PROVIDES HOPE

De Allende was poor initially against the All Blacks before recovering, but we know if he does hit a bad run of form, there’s a good player who can replace him in Andre Esterhuizen. Cheslin Kolbe responded brilliantly to the challenge laid down by Kurt-Lee Arendse, but the same applies to right wing, and the memory of Marco van Staden’s carries at Loftus haven’t yet faded.

Duane Vermeulen and Pieter-Steph du Toit both carried their form from Loftus onto the field in Auckland. Malcolm Marx remains Malcolm Marx, and it is a pity the Bok coaches prioritise his potential impact late in a game, where on Saturday it was already lost, over the momentum he can bring early in a game. And Thomas du Toit has looked the part both times he’s come onto the field.

Nope, there’s reason to be disappointed, and disappointment after a defeat in Auckland is a good indicator of how much the Boks have grown since they lost 57-0 in Albany six years ago, but there isn’t any reason to feel depressed about the Bok World Cup chances. The season is just at an embryonic stage and yet the South Africans have already got a lot out of it.

SECOND ROUND CASTLE LAGER RUGBY CHAMPIONSHIP RESULTS

New Zealand 35 South Africa 20

Australia 31 Argentina 34