For the Springboks this coming week may feel like what they went through at the start of the current international season. It’s not the Castle Lager Rugby Championship at stake this time, just an important World Cup game, but it is very much a case of rewind or second take as Siya Kolisi’s men prepare to face the All Blacks at Twickenham on Friday.
You don’t have to think back too far to find the similarities between the first fortnight of the Championship and now. South Africa went into their second game of the competition off a strong performance. On that occasion their second string team - sorry Eddie, but it was - had put the Wallabies to the sword at Loftus. This time a Bok side that looked far closer to full strength posted more than 50 against a Welsh team that in the end became decidedly second string.
The Boks went to Mount Smart Stadium in Auckland with much confidence six weeks ago. They should do so again as the two giants of world rugby face up on neutral territory just six days after the Cardiff game. And while there will doubtless be those who will point out that it is just a warmup game and the result doesn’t matter, the reality is that it does - for both teams.
KIWIS WON’T WANT TO SURRENDER MOMENTUM
New Zealand have picked up impressive momentum as they continue to bounce back from what for them was a bit of an annus horribilus in 2022 and they will want to keep their unbeaten record intact ahead of their tough opening game of the World Cup against the hosts in Paris. With the two teams possibly destined to meet in a quarterfinal in France, it will also be important to score a psychological blow.
For the Kiwis, a second successive win over their traditional and most feared enemy will be like gold psychologically. Which is one of the reasons that it appears to be generally accepted by the media people and the cognoscenti represented by former All Blacks that the New Zealanders will go full strength at Twickenham.
But it is also not the only reason. The All Blacks haven’t played their top team together since the first Bledisloe Cup game, and their last Rugby Championship test, in Melbourne several weeks ago. The argument, and it is a valid one, is that the first choice team needs a tough game together before they face France exactly two weeks later.
Otherwise they will be hitting the World Cup opener not having played for five weeks, and the Springboks learned to their cost that it can be risky sending an underdone team into action in a big game. Most of the combinations that started in Auckland were playing their first international game of the year and the rust showed and was exploited in ruthless and emphatic style by Sam Cane’s team in the first 20 minutes.
The Boks came back into that game later on but were effectively buried by the early avalanche that saw the All Blacks go ahead 20-3. The All Blacks won’t want that to happen to them against France, for that game could be a defining one at the World Cup - the French crowds are noted for turning against their teams when it doesn’t go well, as we learned in 2007, when they lost the opener to Argentina and then never really recovered.
BOKS TO MAKE IT FULL DRESS REHEARSAL
What about the South African approach to Friday’s game? We don’t have long to wait for the team will be announced at lunch time on Monday, but it would be a major surprise were it not be the side you’d expect for a full final dress-rehearsal for the real thing, which for the Boks is the Pool clash with Scotland that kicks off their campaign on 10 September.
The Boks will have boosted their confidence with their easy win over Wales at a Cardiff venue where they’ve struggled in recent times. But as coach Jacques Nienaber was quick to acknowledge afterwards, there’s a lot to work on, and there should be no prizes for guessing that flyhalf Manie Libbok faces a litmus test.
His misses of easy attempts off the kicking tee were not felt against Wales but they will be in a close game, and while the two men picked up on our television screens on Saturday, Handre Pollard and Lukhanyo Am, will both be missed at the World Cup, it is undeniably Pollard who will be more so.
Libbok has some wonderful attacking touches to his game and he’s tailor-made for the style of his franchise, the DHL Stormers, but even in general play in among the good there is often some bad that could be costly. Libbok is like an artist and has an artist’s temperament, but at a World Cup you want a brain surgeon or airline pilot, and Pollard is more of that.
Libbok has never started against New Zealand much less beaten them, so there’s a lot riding on the Twickenham game for him confidence wise. Why Am will be less missed, unless of course there’s an injury by the time he has recovered from his and still makes it to France, is because of the imperious form that Jesse Kriel is currently in.
There is a line being peddled that Kriel has found his form at last but that may not really be true, the truth might be that he’s now getting more opportunity in Am’s absence and just showcasing the skills and artistry that he has always possessed. It also may be that the Boks are mixing up their game more and playing to his attacking strengths like they didn’t in the past. His defence has always been sound so that’s not a talking point.
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