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Nienaber has big respect for Proudfoot’s England scrum

rugby17 November 2021 07:40| © SuperSport
By:Gavin Rich
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Jacques Nienaber © Gallo Images

If you needed to be convinced of South Africa’s status as the leading scrumming nation on the world rugby stage it might be provided by looking at the number of international scrum coaches who hail initially from this country.

Yes, there are a few Argentinians smattered around the place who are coaching the finer points of what some refer to as the dark arts of rugby, but when you look at the scrum coaches of the top nations, meaning the tier one nations, it is the number of South Africans who jump out at you.

Petrus du Plessis was credited for the better-than-expected Wallaby showing at scrum time against the Boks earlier this year, while last week the world champions came up against a former Bok scrum coach in Pieter de Villiers when they played against Scotland. De Villiers of course is one of a plethora of locally produced front row forwards to play for another country. He played for France, and he had two South Africans in the form of Pierre Schoeman and Oli Kebble in his group for last Saturday’s game.

You probably don’t need to ask England head coach Eddie Jones what he things about South African scrumming expertise. He’s been coach of the 2019 World Cup runners up for six years and he has had two scrum coaches from South Africa - he started out with Neal Hatley, who was schooled in the Eastern Cape and played his first senior rugby out of Durban before moving to Cape Town, and now he has the Boks’ former World Cup winning coach Matt Proudfoot.

Incidentally, Proudfoot is another of those South African props who played international rugby for another country. He played for Scotland, but that bit of history won’t be what concerns Bok coach Jacques Nienaber as his forward pack gets set to do battle with a unit that is now coached by someone who helped guide them to their greatest triumph.

ENGLAND'S SCRUM NUMBERS ARE IMPRESSIVE

England have had a few Covid and injury related problems playing havoc with their front-row plans just recently, and they have now lost hooker Jamie George, who was part of the British and Irish Lions team that played the South African series.

However, partially because he respects what Proudfoot can do, but mostly because of the numbers he has seen related to the England scrumming of late, he answered in the negative when asked if he was licking his lips at the prospect of what the Bok scrum could do on Saturday.

“If one goes into England and their game, as I have in my analysis over the past month, then you will see that they are actually quite similar to us and that they rely quite strongly on a dominant scrum,” said Nienaber.

“The numbers are on their side when it comes to scrumming. They’ve had 21 scrums to exit and attack from, and they’ve got 14 penalties from those scrums. Which is a good percentage. So, there are lots of similarities between them and us. If you look at what they did against Australia, they had four scrums and won three penalties.

“It is a big challenge for us and we know we must keep our feet on the ground. Our scrum has done really well recently but the England numbers add up quite well too,” he added.

STILL ENOUGH EXPERIENCE

Nienaber said he wasn’t sure what team England would select for Saturday’s game and wasn’t clear on which front row forwards would be backed to front his men, but he noted that the potential return of Joe Marler to the mix would mean the addition of experience.

“The way they won the Australia game last week showed the class of England,” he said. “Although if you look at the squad you see a lot of youth, when you look at the squad as a whole, the majority of the squad are still experienced players.

They have a lot of old hands, and that will be even more the case if Marler is back. From the team that played against us in the 2019 World Cup final they still have forwards like Kyle Sinckler, Marot Itoje, Tom Curry, Jimmy Underhill and Courtney Lawes.

“Okay, so Jamie George is injured, but they still have five forwards who played against us in the World Cup final. They are still an experienced team and have the DNA of knowing how to get results. The guys coming in from the bench and the fringes may be inexperienced, but they still have the core of the team from the World Cup final.”

The mention of the World Cup final introduces another reason that the Boks should be wary of England - they’ve had two years to smart over their humiliating defeat in the 2019 World Cup final and must feel they owe the Boks one. Nienaber though talks down the revenge element of Saturday’s game and says that his team has moved on from what happened 24 months ago and suspects England might have done the same.

“I don’t know what Eddie might be telling his players, all I can say is that from our perspective the World Cup feels so long ago and a lot of water has flown under the bridge since then. Since 2019 we’ve played a Lions series and that is more recent history when it comes to the players in this game.

“But we’ve moved on from that too. In rugby you can’t stay rooted in the moment, and we have a new focus now and new objective and we are working towards the next World Cup now in 2023. I am not sure if they will use the memory of the 2019 final to fuel them, but in our case we have certainly moved on from there and I would expect them to have done so too.”

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