It wasn’t only the Springboks’ battered and scratched bodies that were aching when they boarded their flight for Brisbane yesterday.
By RICHARD KNOWLER – The Press
Highlights put in by me, the article is not edited other than highlighting
The South Africans’ egos have been forced through a meat grinder after a two-week tour in New Zealand that has proved as frustrating as it was fruitless.
In failing to gather any competition points in their two tests they were exposed in a number of areas. They were beaten up in the physical collisions, their poor discipline was exposed when Bakkies Botha and Danie Rossouw collected yellow cards and a number of players, No8 Pierre Spies and wing Bryan Habana among them, failed to enhance their reputations.
Adding to their woes, wing Jean de Villiers was yesterday suspended for two weeks because of his spear tackle on Rene Ranger in the first half.
Although Rossouw was unlucky to be sinbinned by Alain Rolland for his gentle foot tap at All Blacks skipper Richie McCaw in the fourth minute, he surely knew, like the other 29 players on the field, even the most minor of transgressions would be punished.
For Boks coach Peter de Villiers this whole experience was a painful reminder of just how quickly the game can evolve and change.
The challenge from the All Blacks ahead of the Wellington test was clear: we are going to run the ball, what can you do to match it?
In reply, the Springboks belligerently announced that their way was the right way. They had beaten the All Blacks in three tests last year with their conservative blueprint of using their brute force up-front to gobble up possession and then kick, kick and kick again down field.
No-one was going to convince them otherwise.
Even after the All Blacks had outscored them by four tries to zip in their 32-12 triumph in Auckland, the Springboks retorted that their tactics had worked well for them in the past, and if executed properly in Wellington, the New Zealanders might be in for a nasty surprise.
Well, we’re still waiting.
Under the new rule interpretations the All Blacks have totalled eight tries to two in both Tri-Nations tests, amassing 63 points to 29, and collected 10 competition points while South Africa will continue to search for their first point against the Wallabies in Brisbane on Saturday night.
Although they failed to match the sublime standards of the Auckland performance in their 31-17 win, the All Blacks still proved they had the mental resolve to back up with another mighty defensive effort, and even in the difficult wet and windy conditions were not prepared to shelve their counter-attacking aspirations.
However, there is still room for improvement before the All Blacks face the Wallabies in Melbourne in a fortnight.
The All Blacks lineout disintegrated in the second half, new wing Rene Ranger needs to look for his support runners more often and skipper Richie McCaw was fortunate not to be yellow carded when slowing the ball down in the second half.
He, and Henry, will be aware they cannot afford to ride their luck in Melbourne on July 31.
Same author had this to say earlier this week.
Will the All Blacks have it so easy in Wellington for the second test on Saturday night? Unlikely. The Springboks will have sorted their lineout, their scrum should be better, defence a lot braver and they will fly into rucks like rocks biffed into wet clay.
But the All Blacks, if they can again match the Boks forwards, will have their opponents wondering what damage the backs can inflict now that they are confident of entering a ruck without worrying about referees penalising them for not releasing the ball quickly.
my type of comment 😆 made on Rugby Heaven
Ty #2 8:17am
De Villiers getting cited for that “dangerous” tackle is utterly ridiculous! Rene was barley 3 feet off the ground and landed on top of de Villiers. I can’t help but wonder if Rene’s mum wasn’t sitting next to the citing commissioner, suppose Richie’s mum couldn’t have been too far away. What a joke! I’ve seen worse at a netball game! Don’t even get me started on the “stomping” Richie got from Danie Rossouw, when I played if you were on the wrong side, you got rucked and wore the scars like a badge of honour. Now it simply means they can’t do their underwear commercials on Monday.
Don’t get me wrong the All Blacks deserved to win, they were the better team by far, but come on, next thing they will be forcing players to wear helmets and 12″ thick pads with a commercial break every 5 min.
Superbul
Lifting tackles it seems are going to be scrutinised. they applied the letter of the law to him.
Smits tackle a couple of years did not deserve any discipline but the AB player got one week.
Smit was lifted to horizontal and landed on his fat ass.
DeVilliers tackle was just past horizontal…the letter of the law is clear and I thing these commisioners are being very strict to stamp out this indescretion. it is very dangerous!
super @ 2
lol, ja bru
watched parts of the game quite a few times this weekend
got angrier everytime i watched the ref’s performance
bloody awful to say the least!!
A back injury has ruled Springbok lock Andries Bekker out of the forthcoming Tri-Nations Test against Australia at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Saturday.
Bekker suffered an acute disc injury towards the end of the Test against the All Blacks in Wellington at the weekend and underwent an MRI scan in the Queensland capital on Monday morning. He has been withdrawn by the medical team and will see a specialist for treatment on his return to South Africa.
@ superBul:
and the injuries are also mounting up. I like your vuvuzela idea when the All Blacks do the haka next time.
Morning guys,
Not being the most astute rugby tactician, can anybody tell me what our S14 teams were doing right when beating the AB teams, and why the Boks are not doing the same to the ABs in the Tri?
As I saw it, our S14 teams this year were not hoisting the ball at every opportunity as the Boks are doing now. Rather, they were mixing-up their attacks and keeping the AB S14 teams guessing.
Does the successful Bulls/Stormers recipe not work at international level and if it doesn’t, why not?
We lost imo by playing January who’s move to WP was not good for him. JDV is completely out of his depth after spending that time at Munster, moving him to inside centre would have cost us even more points imo. He needs to go back to the Currie Cup and get some confidence and playing time. WO as the stats show is not so KAK as all the non Bulls plyers are saying and give him fast ball before you judge him on attack. The Ref was a plain hometown ref and deserves to be cited but you cannot blame him completely for the loss we should have taken him out of the equation by playing better. I would keep the same team with one change Pienaar for RJ.
Sorry non Bulls supporter not players
@ fender:
The answer is easy, R E F.
read this article on Rugaworld and many many others. And you will understand why we were never allowed into the game.
http://www.ruggaworld.com/2010/07/19/rossouws-sinbinning-diabolical/#more-17465
It is time that we stop this Monday hooha and take the matter through. They handle us like kids, give us a lollipop and tell us by Wednesday that we are whiners and bad sportsman. Bull dust we must take this thing through or we will forever sit with this. How i am not sure but it must involve us , TV and all major noise makers.
Airwell wrote:
let me quote what someone said on another blog
DESERVED AN HONEST CONTEST
Moreover, we, the paying public, not to mention the Springboks, deserved an honest contest, and not one altered by a ridiculous yellow card. The All Blacks also deserved to have their victory scored in the fairest of conditions.
Rolland clearly stated that the yellow card was for kicking, but Rossouw did not use his boot, and did not make any significant contact with his knee.
So far in the two Tri-Nations games, we have seen a head butt go unpunished, along with a spear tackle from Jean de Villiers and a shoulder charge from Rene Ranger – actions that can seriously hurt the victims.
Yet Bakkies Botha has been sent to the sin bin for killing the ball, while the All Blacks were able to do this only under threat and without serious sanction in Wellington. Rossouw received a yellow for a bit of child’s play that endangered no one.
Me out now, work calls
OK…I was pretty damm fekked off after Saturdays display, but thinking back, I’m starting to hope that PDV would take this as a lesson and learn from it. The Blacks exposed all out weaknesses ahead of the RWC and showed us that we need to focus other than the kick and chase game….we need a plan B when it comes to teams like NZ and other teams that like to keep the ball in play…specially during FDP and Brussows absence. As soon as Ruan came on and started feeding the ball to the backs, we looked dangerous and I believe it could have been a whole different ball game if we played like this from the start. The blacks expected us to kick and chase, and they were ready for us. Look at how many times we almost scored when we ran at them. I know it’s not easy winning on NZ soil, but I feel we could have easily won Saturdays game…the Blacks was not nearly as good as the week before.
I missed parts of the game…exactly why did Danie Rossouw get yellow carded and did he deserve it?
Super, one of the main reasons why I’m on R-T is to learn about rugby, a game I love, but don’t know too much about tactically. That’s why I enjoy the posts of most notably Morne and Tighthead on the more technical side of the game. That’s also why I asked the questions that I did in post #7.
Now, I can’t demand a response to the questions, neither do I wish to. But please Super, your #10 post pretends to be a response to my questions in #7, but then you fall into the blame-the-ref-game again.
Man, we’re never going to agree on that one, so don’t you want to just share some of your rugby knowledge with me by answering some of the questions that I pose?
Hi Bosotter,
Danie did a really silly thing: first he waived his hand through McCaw’s face and the after McCaw reacted, he jabbed his boot in McCaw’s direction and caught him slightly some where in the torso while McCaw was on the ground.
Danie looked really embarassed about the whole incident during his apology after the game.
The ref’s reaction was in keeping with the foolishness of the whole incident.
Thanks Fender….what a pitty….we can’t afford poor disipline in game like this.
Bos, I couldn’t agree more….
Fender since you respect Morne’s post much more than mine go read what he said on rugaworld
http://www.ruggaworld.com/2010/07/19/under-the-spotlight-referees-and-judicial-processes/
I was the first author in the whole SA that moaned about the ref, yes in minutes of the first test i was willing to put my neck on the block. That made R-T the leading news breaker. Now go and read what all others are saying. And come tell me if i reacted wrong.
Guys we are getting the short stick and we fight each other. Instead of standing together to sort out the mess.
@ fender:
14
Fender can you understand Afrikaans? Maybe i must do my talking in AFR.
I really think we did use the kick and chase in the S14 a lot. It worked for us because we were better coached and there was more continuity in the Stormers and Bulls teams. PdeV did not use the June tests to build our team, he did a lot of experimenting.
The All Blacks used the June tests in preparation for their revenge against us.
Our execution of the kicking game was not sharp in the last 2 tests.
And then it is not ref blaming us for the loss it is a fact that everyone agrees on, the sin binning was diabolical stuff and it certainly did affect us.
I will have a look at the possesion stats and others to see if we had enough ball. I saw someone in NZ said that the ABs had 53% witch gives us a lot of ball. The problem was our ball was slowed, legal or not?
In the first test the stats from the Referees website said this.
Total number of penalties: 17
New Zealand: 12
South Africa: 5
The reasons for the penalties were as follows:
* = points conceded
New Zealand:
Tackle/ruck/maul: 6 (Thorn, Mealamu, Jane, Kaino*, Donnelly, Ben Franks)
Offside: 4 (McCaw*, Cowan, Donnelly*, Ben Franks*)
Discipline: 2 (Read – air tackle; Muliaina – kicking ball away in touch)
South Africa:
Tackle/ruck/maul: 3 (Matfield, Bakkies Botha*, Januarie)
Scrum: 2 (Du Plessis*, BJ Botha)
@ superBul:
Would i be wrong to say that those 6 penalties in the tackle/ruck/maul area spoiled our ball
#19 Thanks for your impression of our S14 tactics and the stats input re the Boks game, Super.
Let me clear up one or two issues:
1) You put in a lot of hard work here at R-T and I for one really appreciate it. When everything goes quiet there will always be some atricle that you’ve put up that I will enjoy reading. Your commitment towards the SWC was especially appreciated by me and I’m sure, Puma and a few others. So, baie dankie vi al jou harde werk en jou altyd entoesiastiese bydraes.
2) I never said that I appreciate Morne’s input more than yours. It is true though that I learn a lot about the game from his articles. Please don’t beat me or yourself about the head if that happens to be true.
3) We will differ, particularly if blaming the ref is going to be your first option whenever your teams/and my team loses. Sorrie, ma dan gan ek en jy nie kan saamstanie. Ek hoop dis ok met jou?
4) Afrikaans is altyd kool met my en jy kannit gerus hie gooi.
Groente
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