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Lessons learnt from Ireland pushing South Africa to the brink

28th June, 2016
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Allister Coetzee might not be the right fit for the Boks. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
Expert
28th June, 2016
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Apart from learning South Africa have no breakdown coach specialist and how seems to make a big difference, what else did we learn from the Springboks’ recent Tests against Ireland?

In no apparent order, allow me to ramble, ruminate, rant, and rave.

First, let us all acknowledge the Springboks have lost their mystique as a ferocious, dangerously physical team. Sébastien Chabal said once nobody is a real Test rugby player until they have experienced the terror of touring South Africa. But those days are gone.

The Irish were not, in any way, not even for a minute, intimidated by this vintage of the Boks. The Irish blindside flank Rhys Ruddock threw his opposite number Siya Kolisi around like it was WWE. The heir to the hardman jersey of the hardest Bok ever, Frik du Preez, desert runner Jan Ellis, rabid tackler Ruben Kruger, Juan Smith, and ‘Bone Collector’ Willem Alberts is tossed around like a rag doll?

Various Bok forwards were cradled in Devin Toner’s arms as newborn lambs in the first Test. The only Boks who retained physical superiority in contact were our three young, promising locks (Eben Etzebeth has missed only two tackles in 2016, in all matches, and the quality of his tackles was superior) and cannonball winger, Ruan Combrinck.

Only about 20 minutes of ultra-physical, straightened, defender-bouncing, and pacey rugby (out of 240 minutes) followed by 20 minutes of aggressive tackling, finally, managed to save the series.

Warren Whiteley is good at making tackles, but not necessarily in mastering tackles. Pieter-Steph du Toit carried the ball, but missed far too many tackles. Most of the Boks’ tackles were passive, until the last stanza in Port Elizabeth.

The Bok tacklers in the first two Tests looked like they were making too many decisions, a sure sign of overcomplicating instructions or dueling coaching messages or youth. At Ellis Park, Kolisi looked as if he was doing algebra when he approached a breakdown.

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Lesson: Bok rugby will never be good rugby if physically dominated.

Yet after each Test, coach Allister Coetzee and his captain, Adriaan Strauss, focused on words like “clinical” and avoiding “silly” penalties and sticking to our structures. What structure was it that was governing our breakdown?

The Boks’ breakdown approach is a real mess. This is not a criticism of one player. But losing 26 turnovers and winning six is an indictment of South Africa’s breakdown regimen. Francois Louw won three turnovers, but where was his help?

Twelve Irishmen won a turnover, only four Boks did likewise. South Africa’s breakdown coach, Richie Gray, was not retained by SARU. So, he went back to Scotland. Gray had helped Heyneke Meyer turn the breakdown into a strength for four years after it was a weakness for three.

So, the Boks have Matt Proudfoot (a set-piece guru) nominally in charge of the breakdown, but Johann van Graan leading all attack issues and Mzwandile Stick (his first 15s coaching gig) in charge of the no-turnover backs, and Jacques Nienaber ruling the defence.

What was the unifying theme? When arriving at the tackle point, was Frans Malherbe thinking of catching an offload, cleaning the tackler, preventing the Toner choke, or just standing guard for Faf de Klerk?

Is that an attack (van Graan) or breakdown (Proudfoot) instruction?

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Looking at the England-Australia series, it looked like Eddie Jones had his team operating like a low-slung tank at the breakdown when on attack, but often committed only one or two English defenders when Australia had the ball. So, 13 or 14 strong English defenders were realigned at each breakdown. Decisions were kept simple.

Arriving at a scrum or lineout offers simplicity; set pieces can be rote learning. But breakdown decisions are massive in today’s game, and the matrix includes different body positions. The Boks arriving at the breakdown looked at sea, except for Etzebeth, Louw, Jaco Kriel, and Whiteley. The Bok backs never really even competed over the ball.

Lesson: The breakdown needs a real specialist coach to simplify arriving players’ decisions and body heights.

But wasn’t this series going to showcase a new Lions-style rugby? Well, we won with defence, increasing kicking (at Newlands, the ratio was 14-34 kicks by South Africa versus Ireland; in Port Elizabeth, the ratio was reversed to 28-18), accurate goal-kicking, a physical onslaught at Ellis Park, and one-off runners.

Lions played well, but not as lions. Strauss loitered at first receiver. Faf hoisted box kicks, with mixed success. Elton Jantjies never took it to the line, preferring to hold and pass inside (for one fortunate try) or launch a pinpoint cross-kick pass to JP Pietersen.

Dozens of times a Boks runner was surprised by the ball and shuffled a few feet before being tackled backwards.

Lesson 1: The big change has yet to be seen.

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Lesson 2: The coaching mismatch was a chasm.

Joe Schmidt was like a driver of a Yugo keeping his ragged-out car in the race until the final lap against a McLaren, because Coetzee had no pit crew, or they were all on different schedules and nobody had brought spare tyres.

When you select no-cap or low-cap players, you don’t know what you will get. Some front, others don’t.

Jantjies was thoroughly outplayed by the Irish second-string flyhalf over 215 minutes. In fact, of all the head-to-head position-by-position advantages held by Ireland in this series, Paddy Jackson’s edge over Jantjies was the largest gap, with the possible exception of hooker (where Coetzee spurned the in-form Malcolm Marx and European star Bismarck du Plessis, both of whom would hardly play the passive, polite, pedantic choirboy style exhibited by the new Boks skipper).

A new (nice) captain leading a newish team coached by a new coach and a backline coach newer than new. Up against a well-drilled, communicative, intentional team led by Rory Best and Schmidt.

Combrinck, of course, looks like a man who likes Test footy. He said he would catch a cannonball for his country. He kicked like a cannon, ran like a mule with his bum on fire, and smiled the whole time.

Faf also looked like a Test player, but will need to sort his kicking. Whiteley has a winning temperament and these players have a knack of finding a way to get involved at squeaky bum time, in close games. Steven Kitshoff marched on and won a penalty in his first scrum and was not overawed.

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On the other hand, Lionel Mapoe struggled to find the pace of international rugby, we had no backup hooker to trust, Lwazi Mvovo was out of his depth in defence, and Duane Vermeulen has been eating too many croissants.

So, winning 2-1 (even with the shame of losing the first ever Test to Ireland in South Africa) is so much better than the reverse, and ‘winning close’ is a skill all its own.

Maybe this is one thing to remember. Because the Rugby Championship shapes as a battle for second place against Australia, and how often have we won in Australia recently?

On the positive side, first phase play improved throughout the series. Exit kicks hit a nadir in the second Test, in the first half. From that point on, the Boks got out of their 22 relatively easily.

We learnt that having two big hard wings (Pietersen and Combrinck) is a necessity. We learnt that our midfield is still a mystery. Jesse Kriel must wonder what transformed him from wunderkind to the lost boy.

In contrast, Conor Murray and Jackson seamlessly formed a smooth duo and the Marshall-Olding combo clicked many a time.

Most of all, we learnt that this was a false dawn. There is much to do before the Rugby Championship in order to avoid humiliation.

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