There is yet to be a team or squad selected that everyone agrees with.

This holds true not only to South African and Springbok rugby, but really rugby worldwide.

I decided to wait a couple of days before I give my two cents worth on the squad selected for the Northern Hemisphere tour so that the usual vitriol can pass whenever a touring squad is selected, and I guess it was a good thing.

Good because at least I have an idea now where most people have a problem with the selections.

I was asked on Sunday what I thought of the players assembled for the upcoming tour, and my answer was that I do not really have an opinion on it, well not yet anyway.

I tend to wait and listen to some of the reasoning coming from the management staff (coaches) on their reasoning for picking certain players, and leaving some out – through this I try and establish the dynamic involved when coaches and selectors actually sat down to pick these guys for the tour.

You see unless we understand the dynamic behind certain selections it is impossible to assess whether the selection(s) were indeed justified or not.

None of us are actually part of the Springbok setup (well apart from certain scribes of course…) so the best we can come up with as supporters or outside viewers are guesses as to why certain guys are there, and why certain guys are not.

This guessing game however is where it gets dangerous, because it is usually driven by emotion and not logic.

But when you defy logic like a recent Business Day column I read then it just becomes plain silly.

The column suggested that things in SA Rugby has not changed much, because we still give away Springbok places (no caps or blazers are awarded for the mid-week team) thanks in large to tokenism, or in plain English, giving spots away to black token players to please government.

Having looked at the squad selected this opinion simply defies any logic. Some of the most questionable decisions within the squad selected has to do with white players, positional switching and questionable form which justifies selection.

If anything, what I picked up from the squad was more a case of selecting guys based on favouritism which is a hell of a long way off tokenism.

Many of the left field selections are players who Peter de Villiers know, or have coached at different levels but mainly age-group level. So this shows me it is rather a case of the coach going with ‘better the devil you know’ selection than anything else.

We all know that we have problems in depth in Springbok rugby where we need to get players up to a level to easily slot into positions at test match rugby should we lose any of our current world beaters to retirement or injury.

From what I gather, this is also what the coaching staff and selectors looked at when they selected the squad if their statements following the announcement is anything to go by.

Whether they are on the right path remains to be seen, but the fact that they at least identified the path (read problem) is a positive step in the right direction.

So then the question remains; ‘Did they get it right?’

And if you want my opinion on this, I would have to say that in some ways yes, but in most ways no. But then again, who the hell am I ?