Russell’s impact crucial to Bok preparation for Sunday

Everyone is talking about the tempo the Wallabies bring to their game and it is the reason the name Finn Russell would have been writ large in the minds of the Springboks in their preparations for Sunday’s Castle Lager Rugby Championship showdown at CBUS Super Stadium on the Gold Coast.

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The British and Irish Lions stuck largely to Warrenball, meaning coach Warren Gatland’s mostly kicking orientated game, in their series against the Boks. There were attempts to quicken up play, but they were largely circumvented by a combination of factors. With Dan Biggar as the starting flyhalf the Lions’ approach was always going to be akin to the more conservative Wales style.

Where that did change was when Scotland’s Finn Russell came onto the field early in the third test after the injury to Biggar. The lift in tempo was noticeable, the Boks had to scramble on defence, and for most of the first half the hosts were barely holding on as the Lions threatened to run them ragged. Had it not been for some poor decision making, the Lions might have been out of sight at halftime.

The Boks did adjust in the second half, and that should be noted by those who are fearing what the quick tempo Aussie playing style might do to the Boks on Sunday. But in that first half the Boks did get a taste of what they might expect on the Gold Coast, where Quade Cooper’s selection in the No10 jersey for the Wallabies has amply telegraphed the host nation’s intent.

Cooper will be tasked with the role played by Russell at Cape Town Stadium, and while he is a veteran now, he does still have many of the silky skills that made him such a handful when he was a pivotal member of the (Queensland) Reds team that won Super Rugby in 2011. He should also of course have some of the weaknesses that saw him not last at international level, which is the flip side for Australia.

SEVERAL FLIP SIDES FOR AUSSIES

And there is more than one flip side for the Australians as they go into this game. As in if you asked them where they got playing that style against the New Zealand All Blacks the answer would be that it got them nowhere. They were well beaten in all three Bledisloe Cup tests, and the fact two of those games were at the citadel of Kiwi rugby, Eden Park in Auckland, only partly explains that. For they were well beaten into second in Perth last week too.

There might have been a good reason Gatland didn’t coach the Lions to play a wide, running game against the Boks. He probably knew that it could be suicide against such a good defensive system, a defensive system which hasn’t conceded more than two tries in a test match since the opening RWC 2019 game against New Zealand in Yokohama close on to two years ago.

One thing the Boks do know how to do is seize on opposition mistakes, and when watching them struggling against the spoiling tactics of the Pumas late in their second game against the Argentinians it was hard not to feel that they’d have done better against a team that was less negative. And Australia are a perfect example of an almost anti-negative team, something underlined by the number of tries against the run of play they surrendered against the All Blacks.

While the memory of the Russell wizardry would have given the Boks something concrete to work on this week as they prepare for a team that plays a different style of rugby to what they have faced since 2019, the Australian exposure to what the Boks will bring to Sunday’s game has been minimal.

FOCUSED PHYSICALITY

No-one would dare suggest the All Blacks lack physicality or are short when it comes to their defensive game, but the Kiwis did give the impression in the Bledisloe Cup fixtures that they knew they didn’t have to focus on that in order to win. What the Wallabies will have to face down on Sunday will be a far more focused physicality and aggressive defensive line and it is going to be interesting to see how they deal with it.

They have had the advantage of playing against the team that has been most consistently the top one in world and southern hemisphere rugby over the past few decades in three successive test matches, but then the Boks have just played and beaten the Lions. And they started that series well short of match practice and built strongly into it as it progressed.

John Smit’s team spoke about how the higher intensity of a Lions series prepared them for their overwhelming Tri-Nations success in 2009, when they whitewashed the All Blacks 3-0, and the evidence of the games against Argentina, both of which the Boks won with consummate ease and with something to spare, suggests the current team has been helped in a similar way.

LOT OF PRESSURE ON SA

What the Boks do take into this game is the pressure of being the world champions, which does put a target on their back. And after the Wallabies were so well beaten by the All Blacks, the Boks know they will have to win at minimum if they are to take some confidence into the looming battle with their fiercest traditional foe.

The Boks do not have a good post isolation and professional era record in Australia, but such has been the growth of the team in what will be remembered as the Rassie Erasmus era that they will be expected to win on Sunday and again in Brisbane a week later. Australian rugby has slipped quite a distance since they were twice world champions in the 1990s and you should be expected to beat them, even on their home patch, if you have claims to be the world’s No1 team.

And as you can only impose tempo on a game if you win the forward battle, we should expect the Wallaby attempts to inject some buzz into their play to come to nought and the visitors to win by more than a score. Bok teams have faltered unexpectedly on Australian soil in the past but this is a more organised, professional and mature Bok team than most of their predecessors.

TEAMS

Australia: Tom Banks, Andrew Kellaway, Len Ikitau, Samu Kerevi, Marika Koroibete, Quade Cooper, Tate McDermott, Rob Valetini, Michael Hooper (c), Lachlan Swinton, Matt Philip, Izack Rodda, Allan Alaalatoa, Folau Fainga'a, Angus Bell. Replacements: Feleti Kaitu'u, James Slipper, Taniela Tupou, Rob Leota, Pete Samu, Nic White, Reece Hodge, Jordan Petaia.

South Africa: Willie le Roux; S’bu Nkosi, Lukhanyo Am, Damian de Allende, Makazole Mapimpi; Handre Pollard, Faf de Klerk; Duane Vermeulen, Franco Mostert, Siya Kolisi, Lood de Jager, Eben Etzebeth, Frans Malherbe, Bongi Mbonambi, Steven Kitshoff. Replacements: Malcolm Marx, Ox Nche, Vincent Koch, Marco van Staden, Kwagga Smith, Jasper Wiese, Herschel Jantjies, Damian Willemse.

Referee: Luke Pearce (England)

Kick-off: 12.05 SA time

Prediction: Boks to win by 10