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SPIRO: Watch out everyone, here come the Springboks!

6th October, 2014
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Handre Pollard, a bright prospect for the Springboks. (AAP Image/NZN/SNPA, John Cowpland)
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6th October, 2014
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It took 43 minutes of play in the vibrant Springboks versus All Blacks Test at the Ellis Park coliseum (with visitors usually playing the role of the Christians about to be confronted with raging lions) for Handre Pollard to hoist his first high kick of the match.

Against the Wallabies at Cape Town, a week earlier, the Springboks put on series after series of ball-in-hand attacks, one of them reaching 30 phases.

Before these two important home Tests for the Springboks, the South African media had been giving the national side a battering for their kick-happy play and begging them, as Andy Capostagno did in the Mail & Guardian, to front up and prove that they are better than their results suggest.

In their first four matches of the Rugby Championship 2014, the Springboks had possession of the ball for only 13 minutes and 6 seconds in each match; the lowest possession of any team in the tournament.

The low rate of possession was not due to poor set pieces. The Springboks’ lineout, as demonstrated against the All Blacks, is the best in the tournament. The Springboks’ backrow too, especially with Duane Vermeulen in devastating form, has dominated all their opposition loose forwards in the break down area (again, as they did against the All Blacks).

The possession problem for the Springboks was due entirely to the brain-dead strategy of once winning the ball from set pieces or from rucks, then kicking it away to the opposition to use in whatever way they wanted. By way of highlighting this kick-first and then think-later approach, the Springboks averaged 33 kicks from general play each match before their last two Tests against the Wallabies and the All Blacks.

Out of South Africa, the Springboks could have been deemed one-trick/kick ponies.

Back in South Africa, however, a remarkable transformation in the Springboks game plan has taken place. If it weren’t for their green jerseys, you would have sworn the Springboks were the All Blacks.

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The transformation had a slightly shaky start against the Wallabies. It was only in the last 10 minutes of the Cape Town Test that the Springboks’ multi-phase game overwhelmed the Wallabies and three tries were scored as the floodgates opened.

Against the All Blacks, the floodgates opened early on as the Springboks scored two sensational tries against the tightest defence in world rugby. One of the tries was from long distance, the sort of position on the field that the inevitable Morne Steyn bomb would be launched.

The All Blacks came back, as they usually do, but the Springboks forced the last two penalties of the Test, one of them converted by choirboy match-winner Patrick Lambie, and the other to end on the final whistle the last series of phases by the All Blacks with play inside the Springboks half.

Here we have to note the other major change in the Springboks preparation. The coaching staff have realised that it is all very well to aspire to the ball-in-hand game, but a team has to be super-fit (like the All Blacks) to do so. So the Springboks conditioner has deliberately aimed to produce lean and mean forwards, rather than the beefy monsters of the past who looked as though they had spent breakfast, lunch, dinner and a late super in a fast food hang-out.

There was just enough energy left in the Springboks’ tired bodies to repel that last desperate All Blacks attack. The Springboks’ fitness is the key to pushing on with their new, ball-in-hand game.

We only have to look at the way the Wallabies have been collapsing in the latter stages of their Tests to see that there is more to running rugby than merely expressing the intention to play this type of game. It only works if the energy levels remain high throughout the Test. Someone needs to tell Ewen McKenzie this simple truth.

The other requirement for the running game is that the playmakers, essentially the halfback and flyhalf, have to buy into the method. For the Springboks this meant dropping Steyn, not only from the starting XV but from the 23-man playing squad.

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Pollard, the new golden boy of South African rugby (a deserved credit, incidentally) has provided a flat alignment, an instinct for running the ball, and a devastating break, as he showed with his try against the All Blacks, all in the manner of a young Dan Carter.

When he is substituted, Lambie comes on and attacks the line with more sinuous running, but the effect is the same. The Springboks’ backline in the last two Tests, especially, has been taking the ball into the contact areas and engaging the defence rather than trying to overwhelm the opposition by giving them the ball and then trying to tackle them into submission.

That all this is happening under the coaching regime of Heyneke Meyer is a revelation to Springboks supporters who see him as the disciple of the ‘Blue Bulls**t’ kicking game.

A well-informed friend of mine in South Africa sent me an email after the Springboks victory over the All Blacks saying this: “I cannot bring myself to like Meyer as a coach but am forced through gritted teeth to admit that he is starting to loosen the chains of conservatism which courses through the blood of a good Blue Bull.”

The test for Meyer and his Springboks’ devotion to the running game will come when the Springboks struggle to defeat a tenacious side or sides on their European tour this year or during the Rugby Championship in 2015.

The traditional psychological fallback position for Springboks side when they are under pressure is to adopt the laager mentality, circle the wagons and retreat into a fortress defensive mentality.

Meyer – whose history shows is clearly infused with the laager mentality – will have to encourage the break-out, attack mentality for his team, even when his instincts are screaming out for him to bring back old iron boots himself, Steyn.

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The point here is that the ball-in-hand game has to be played with a certain nerveless efficiency to be truly effective.

What happens next for the Springboks is the crucial factor. Will they build on the gains made with their expansive game plan on the European tour? Or will they revert to type?

For now, though, we can speculate on what has happened and make the observation that the Springboks look like the team that will present a formidable challenge to any other side, including the All Blacks, in the 2015 Rugby World Cup.

I would make one other point, which relates to the All Blacks. In the past when the All Blacks lost a Test there would be national grieving and predictions that they are rooned and might never win again. This is an age-old New Zealand meme. I remember as a youngster being told when our local team lost that “the blinds will be down in every house on the block”.

I have been impressed with the calmness and rationality the New Zealand media and public have taken. It started with Steve Hansen conceding that the better team won. The media has pointed out, as Sir Graham Henry did a couple of weeks ago in anticipation of an inevitable loss, that good teams learn a lot more from losses than they do from defeats.

The All Blacks will learn that Beauden Barrett is too passive at number 10. He tends to recycle rather than engage the defensive line. His best position may ultimately be fullback for the All Blacks. Israel Dagg misses too many tackles to be a totally convincing custodian. The pack needs someone like Vermeulen, who can really put dents and holes into the opposition defensive line with his charges. Brodie Retallick was being used, successfully, for this job and his absence was a factor in the All Blacks loss.

Getting back to the Springboks, now that Meyer and his team cannot be dismissed as one-trick ponies, the question is whether they can build on the momentum and excitement generated against the Wallabies and the All Blacks on their November.

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If they can, then watch out everyone during Rugby World Cup 2015. The Springboks will be on the march.

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