It wasn’t perfect and there was no Castle Lager Rugby Championship title this time but the Springbok coaches should feel they’ve been effective in spreading the net ahead of Tuesday’s announcement of the 33 man squad to play at the Rugby World Cup.
Sometimes in the past there’s been a feeling that the incumbent coaches and selectors haven’t given enough players a chance to stake a claim for a RWC place but not this time. There were 38 players used, which isn’t dissimilar to the number of players used in the four games when the Boks famously lost a four test series to the British and Irish Lions in 1974 and that was seen as crazy.
There was method to the craziness though and the nine changes made in each of the first two tests and the 13 made for the last game in this phase of the World Cup buildup before coach Jacques Nienaber settles on a team to go forward with in the remaining two warmup fixture were for a good reason.
The depth test was passed in the sense that when you look through the squad, in most positions there are now at least two players challenging strongly and in only a very few areas should there be a feeling that the Boks will be in trouble should there be an injury to a frontliner.
While the opening 20 minutes against the All Blacks in Auckland was sobering from a South African perspective, perhaps that can be ascribed to rust. And lack of continuity in selection, and therefore not having a settled team, could partly explain the high error rate against Argentina in Johannesburg and also the failure to convert dominance in the first half in Buenos Aires.
NEXT TWO GAMES WILL TELL US A LOT
The next two games, against Wales in Cardiff on 19 August and New Zealand at Twickenham on 25 August will tell us whether they were teething problems or not. As Nienaber has said he will choose his top team for the Wales game, it is interesting to speculate on what that team might look like.
The squad announcement on Tuesday will see some good players left out, but the starting team, or match day 23 they envisage using for the bigger games, would surely have been the starting point when the coaches intensified the selection process.
Let’s start at the back three. Willie le Roux has played fullback in most of the games so far, but the man who was used in the No 15 jersey in the exception game, Damian Willemse, might well have the inside lane given the aerial strengths he displayed in Buenos Aires and also his greater physicality and abrasiveness. The memory of Le Roux being bumped off so easily when the All Blacks scored their second try at the Mount Smart Stadium has not faded, and all the international teams will know that he has a tackling weakness.
Not so Willemse, who also isn’t that far behind Le Roux in the attacking game, if he is at all, and he showed that with his contribution to the Makazole Mapimpi try in this most recent match against a Los Pumas team that weren’t nearly as good at home as they were away in their two previous matches (they started their tour with a win over Australia in Sydney before losing by one point in Johannesburg).
MOODIE SHOULD PLAY
Talking of Mapimpi, the 2019 World Cup hero was much better in Buenos Aires than he was in Auckland, but could still have his place in the squad under threat. For my money, Canan Moodie did enough with his outstanding game against the Pumas to suggest himself for a place in the starting team for the big games, with Cheslin Kolbe and Willemse as his fellow back three members.
Why no Kurt-Lee Arendse? Of course Arendse is a match winner and X-factor player of note, and he must be in the World Cup group. But Moodie’s aerial skills that were writ large this past weekend are surely a must after that area of their game was so badly exposed by the All Blacks. Arendse and Kolbe are similar players with similar physical stature, Moodie will bring better balance to the combination.
Jesse Kriel showed against the Pumas that the concerns about what might happen if Lukhanyo Am was injured at outside centre are misplaced. He is a fine player when in form and will be eager to make up for having to fly home early with an injury from the last World Cup. But of course if Am is fit he has to start, and ditto Damian de Allende alongside him even though Andre Esterhuizen has mounted a strong challenge for the No 12 jersey.
Manie Libbok has been given plenty of game time and has shown he is capable of transferring his form for the DHL Stormers in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship onto the international stage, and he ended any debate over whether there should still be a place for veteran Elton Jantjies. Handre Pollard though has to start if he’s fit, and while there wasn’t much wrong with Libbok’s allround game, his inconsistency from the place kicking tee in Buenos Aires confirmed that.
Jaden Hendrikse hasn’t played yet in the international season so you imagine he will be given a chance in the remaining two warmup games, with Faf de Klerk, boasting experience of helping guide the Boks to a World Cup triumph four years ago in Japan, probably earmarked to wear the No 9.
VERMEULEN BACK TO HIS BEST
There are two excellent No 8s, actually three, to choose from in the form of Duane Vermeulen, Jasper Wiese and Evan Roos, but Vermeulen has undeniably been the standout and is boasting his best form since 2019. Pieter-Steph du Toit is also showing why he was the World Rugby Player of the Year after the last World Cup.
Siya Kolisi will go to the World Cup but there might still be a need to use someone else in the No 6 during the warmup phase. Deon Fourie, slated to be in the squad as cover for both hooker and looseforward, was outstanding in being himself against the Pumas but Marco van Staden might be backed against Wales if Kolisi isn’t fit.
When it comes to lock Eben Etzebeth picks himself and normally you’d say the same about Lood de Jager, but the latter looked rusty and was poor against the All Blacks in the second Rugby Championship game and was then withdrawn from the first official warmup against the Pumas because he was unwell. You’d expect him though to wear the No 5 jersey as RG Snyman looks like he has been assigned to the specialist Bomb Squad duties and Franco Mostert, the other challenger for that position, is being deployed mainly as a blindside flank these days.
FRONT ROW RICHES
With Ox Nche still injured, the front row should have a 2019 look to it, with Steven Kitshoff and Frans Malherbe at prop and one of Malcolm Marx or Bongi Mbonambi at hooker. The debate over which of the two No 2s should start may be irrelevant as it will depend on the identity of the opposition at the World Cup.
When it comes to the replacement bench there are so many front row options even in the current absence of Nche, and while Thomas du Toit has been good when he’s played, surely Trevor Nyakane’s excellence when retreaded back to loosehead in the Lions series has not been forgotten.
A POSSIBLE BOK FIRST CHOICE TEAM: Damian Willemse, Cheslin Kolbe, Lukhyanyo Am, Damian de Allende, Canan Moodie, Handre Pollard, Faf de Klerk, Duane Vermuelen, Pieter-Steph du Toit, Marco van Staden (Siya Kolisi when fit), Lood de Jager, Eben Etzebeth, Frans Malherbe, Malcolm Marx or Bongi Mbonambi, Steven Kitshoff. REPLACEMENTS: Marx or Mbonambi, Trevor Nyakane, Vincent Koch, RG Snyman, Franco Mostert, Kwagga Smith, Jaden Hendrikse/Grant Williams, Willie le Roux.
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