Spate of injuries support Bok decision to miss Rugby Champs

There may have been a lot of Antipodean scoffs when SA Rugby cited player welfare last week for the decision to pull out of this year's Castle Lager Rugby Championships.

But just one look at this weekend's round of Vodacom Super Rugby Unlocked would make for sober viewing after several high-profile players picked up some serious injuries.

With rugby returning after so long on the sidelines because of the Covid-pandemic, it is almost expected that the odd injury would happen.

But in the larger scheme of things, it has been a weekend horror show as Sergeal Petersen (Stormers), Gio Aplon (Bulls) and Ruan Pienaar (Cheetahs) all seemed to pick up long-term injuries.

Aplon seems to have torn knee ligaments, while Pienaar's knee injury may not be as serious and could see him back before the end of the year.

Petersen tore a quad muscle in the Stormers' win over the Lions and also seems set for a lengthy spell on the sidelines.

Back in June when Aotearoa rugby returned in New Zealand, it took a few weeks before the NZ Rugby Players Association voiced its concerns.

"You just have to watch the games," Rob Nichols said. "They're incredibly intense emotionally and physically. It's as close as you're going to get to test rugby. We all know that if you are to ask players to play three tier-one test matches in a row. to come down emotionally and then get back up is pretty hard."

The Hurricanes lost Ngani Laumape and Frasier Armstrong early on, the Chiefs lost Solomon Alaimalo with a shoulder injury and the Crusaders lost Braydon Ennor, David Havili, Ethan Blackadder and Scott Barrett for most of the season.

And when rugby resumed up north Springboks Lood de Jager, RG Snyman, Eben Etzebeth and Handre Pollard all picked up injuries in the opening weeks after the restart.

So while the injuries may be expected, they obviously come at a high cost for the teams, with Aplon, Petersen and Pienaar all expected to have been key players for their sides this season.

The Bulls still have Kurt-Lee Arendse on the sideline with a niggle, while Duane Vermeulen missed the first week of competition with a knee niggle.

'PLAYER-WELFARE RISK'

Add to the injuries that have decimated the Phakisa Pumas and it is clear that restarting rugby after such a long time takes its toll.

So with medical advice saying injuries are a high probability, Sports Scientist Ross Tucker confirmed the risk in a chat with Cato Louw on RugbyRocks last week.

"When you frame it like that, you realise you're going to go into an international-level tournament off the back of long travel, having played - some of these players - only one decent quality match, and off the back of a very, very poor training period of over six months [during lockdown]," he said.

"A lot of these players had no access to gym and normal high-performance services - medical, physio, etc - from March all the way through to late July, August. So there would have been a considerable loss of conditioning.

The next question is can you re-condition a player from July and get them match-ready? I don't think you can.

"You have to regain the conditioning you lost and get contact-ready, and then you've got to play New Zealand and Australia, who've had four months of rugby. It's a very difficult ask.

"I can see why, with the quarantine requirements, the Springboks wouldn't want to go, as there will be player-welfare risks."

Tucker added that this was clear from other sports post-lockdown.

"I've been following the NBA and NFL and they've had a lot more injuries as a result of going into competition without an adequate pre-season. The injury numbers were also up when the German Bundesliga resumed after lockdown."

So while no test rugby was always going to be a disappointment, returning after a long lockdown to a contact sport was sure to take its toll.

And sending an underdone Bok team to face teams that have had a full domestic season and several test matches under their belt would have served little purpose.

In the meantime, coaches will be hoping the next few rounds of Super Rugby Unlocked produce less injuries and more tries.