Jean De Villiers
Springbok captain Jean de Villiers is clear that his team need to take a massive step up before they face the Wallabies in Perth in their next Castle Lager Rugby Championship game on 6 September.
The Bok captain arrived home from the great Salta escape – where the Boks needed a penalty four minutes from time to beat a plucky, aggressive Argentinean team – knowing that the weight of public outrage at the result would be waiting for his team.
But De Villiers is a pragmatist, and, as he points out: it wasn’t the greatest of performances, but a win is a win.
SuperSport
While there is a lot for the Bok management to work on before they take on the Wallabies, and even more before they head to Wellington to face the All Blacks a week later, it isn’t all doom and gloom in the Bok camp, even though it may seem so for their fans.
“We’re not happy with our performance but definitely happy with the two wins,” De Villiers said on arriving back in Johannesburg.
“I think we all know that this is a very tough competition and if you keep on winning – if you are not firing on all cylinders, that is a positive result. We’ll take the two wins but there’s still a lot of hard work that needs to be done before the next game.”
While De Villiers is still adamant that the Argentineans are a lot better side than their 12th place on the IRB rankings portrays, he accepts that the pressure is on the team to show they can do better when they head to Perth. Argentina’s lowly log position comes mainly from the fact they play a B-team in the June internationals and only have their European based stars for the Rugby Championship, meaning their ranking has been in freefall for the last two years.
The ranking clearly isn’t something Los Pumas care too much for, and most rugby fans will agree that on the evidence of the last two weeks they would give most teams ahead of them on the rankings a massive fright, if not condemn them to defeat.
Still, for a team that constantly talks about concentrating on their own game, the Boks have a lot of work to do. They aren’t satisfied with how they played, something that De Villiers took every opportunity to underline.
“I think that’s a good thing (that the public expect more from us),” De Villiers admitted. “If the supporters and public can put as much pressure on us as possible to achieve better and perform better, then I see that as a positive sign. I think once we are happy with mediocrity and just putting up an average performance then I think we are in trouble. We see it as a good thing and we know we didn’t play well. We need to up our game and we need to improve.”
The Bok captain said he did take note of the impressive All Black performance on Saturday in putting up a half century against the Wallabies in their demolition at Eden Park, but that for now, they are in the distance. First priority is the Perth game, and that is where the Boks need to focus their attention right now.
“They were impressive but we are only seeing them in three weeks’ time,” De Villiers said on the All Blacks.
“The focus for us right now is Australia and putting up a good performance against them, after that we’ll take on the next one.”
“At the end of the day we’re happy that we won two out of two and we’re top of the log at the moment in the Rugby Championship.
“But we are very realistic in the way we played and what lies ahead for us.
“There needs to be improvement and if we want to walk away with the trophy at the end of the tournament we need to put up better performances.”
@ grootblousmile:
Bymekaar kom by TradeMarx, dan sal ons sommer self kies waar ons wil sit 😆 daar is mos baie oop sitplekke deesdae
@ Pietman:
Cheers Pietman
@ superBul:
Old story
In the 1980s the new Mugabe Gov hired Ex Rhodesian SAS to roam the Zambezie Vallie to kill poachers on sight, they closed it down due to lack of funds
The Rhinos were a good source of foreign currency for the private game reserves, I know for a fact that many keep selling overseas their stock and concentrate on protecting the few left for breeding on the reserve, keeping them in designated areas
Used to be a large private ranch of Rhinos between Krugersdorf and Randfontein, few years ago we went there but found a squatter camp instead
@ IAAS:
Yep, I downloaded the clip, haven’t seen it in years, forgot about it.
Thanks for posting 😆
241 @ nortierd:
Ek moet juis een of ander tyd die week my nuwe lot VIP parkeerkaartjies by Loftus loop haal… en sal dan nou maar more antwoord en sê ek gaan Press Box toe.
Maar dan reel ons so dat ek julle vooraf by TradeMarx kry.
Wie gaan almal?
@ IAAS:
Speaking of it’s only Monday, GBS had an idea about an open thread on a specific evening, like the last one that happened a couple of weeks ago.
Posting of music clips, reminiscing about old bloggers and blogging days etc.
Might be a fun idea and if bloggers are up to it, I’m sure we can open a thread specifically for something like that….sort of an anything goes type concept, chat about and share music etc
240 @ Pietman:
Tjorts vriend!
@ grootblousmile:
Sover myself, Stormersboy en IAAS. Gummi en Gena kan dit nie maak nie, so ons soek nog Stormers/WP manne, maar ons sal n paar verdwaalde en geskokte Bulle ook aanneem vir die dag
248 @ nortierd:
Farkit, so ek moet in HAAS en Stormpoppieboykie se bakkies ook vaskyk…. hehehe
180 nortierd wrote:
nortie… don’t play the victim now, bud… why have you been taken on…?
seriously…?
okay firstly… some of us merely mentioned that… we thought the boks played badly… and I even said argentina deserved to win the match… but… we said that we would take the win… no matter how ugly…
please name anyone who said they were happy with the way we played against the argies…? no one has said that… but many of us have said that despite a really poor performance… we are at least happy with that they somehow managed the win…
you then had a full go at anyone who dared to suggest that a win was a win and was happy about the win… you twisted many comments to try and make our comments fit your argument… and you have repeatedly referred back to posts with some rather snide comments taking more digs at people who did not share your stridently aired opinion…
and you expect no one to have a gentle go back at you… come on norts… get real bud… obviously people were going to respond to your taunts…
secondly… as I mentioned yesterday… you keep editorializing… (putting words in the mouths of people who never said those words…) about what you say our comments are/were… but are not being accurate… or specific… so naturally people are going to respond to you again…
in this comment 180 of yours… you say people “embrace mediocrity”… please quote who said they embrace mediocrity and give the thread and number of the comment… none of us are happy with the standard of play offered up by the boks… and we all said so in our initial posts and comments after the game… but you have chosen to ignore those parts of our comments…
then yesterday you tried to imply myself and iaas had said things we never said… so we both responded and challenged you on your editorializing…
did you expect neither of us to call you out on it…?
so it’s a bit rich to ask why people are having a go at you, no…? in this case… to borrow from black panther and popps… we are simply returning your serve…
but of course you know this… and seem to be just drumming up the clicks for rt… 😉
😆
@ nortierd:
Cool – who wants to argue about the merits or de-merits of the Boks for the next 2 weeks. 🙄
Anyway, I’m out for the evening – catch on the rebound – but definitely at Trademarx on Sat.
250 @ ufo:
Yeah… and I did not even put him up to it… it’s all his own doing!!
Hehehe
144 @ superBul:
249 @ grootblousmile:
Ons moet kyk wie dit almal kan maak, jammer Gummi en Gena kan nie, meeste WP manne is mos in die Kaap
252 @ grootblousmile:
hehehe… i never doubted you gb…!! 😆
@ IAAS:
For sure, think you are 100% with the kick off time and I was wrong, looking forward to it
255 @ ufo:
Thank goodness!
@ ufo:
Kom ons klink ‘n glasie oppie Bokke!
Ja julle lee glas-fokkers ook!
@ ufo:
“. I think once we are happy with mediocrity and just putting up an average performance then I think we are in trouble”
Jean De Villiers agrees 😀
grootblousmile wrote:
Daai glas lyk darem nie heeltemal leeg nie
Anyway fellas, I had a hard weekend of rest and relaxation… I need to go to bed!
@ grootblousmile:
Cheers, also out
260 @ nortierd:
hahaha… that’s the part you keep missing nortie… 😉
we all agree with that… and have said so from the beginning of our discussion… none of us are expressed any happiness about the way we played…
but some of us are happy with small mercies and will readily accept the win and log points… which keeps us in the comp… IF (big big IF) we raise our game big time and seriously challenge auz and nz…
cheers guys…
yeah… me too…
laters…
@ ufo:
Tough challenge ahead, we seriously have to lift our game…
Cheers, catch up soon 😆
This must be the easiest WC draw ever for SA
Sat, 19 Sep 2015 WC Pool B South Africa v Japan Brighton Community Stadium 16:45
Sat, 26 Sep 2015 WC Pool B South Africa v Samoa Villa Park 16:45
Sat, 03 Oct 2015 WC Pool B South Africa v Scotland St James Park 16:45
Wed, 07 Oct 2015 WC Pool B South Africa v United States Olympic Stadium 16:45
@ superBul:
Easier than
England
Samoa
South Africa
Tonga
United States
Fiji
Argentina
England?
@ superBul:
Goodnight SB, lekker in die tuin werk more.
All Blacks under Hansen
Total Home Away Neutral
Played 33 100.0% 17 51.5% 16 48.5% 0 –
Wins 30 90.9% 17 100.0% 13 81.3% 0 –
Losses 1 3.0% 0 – 1 6.3% 0 –
Draws 2 6.1% 0 – 2 12.5% 0 –
Totals Points 1067 vs 519
Tries 116 vs 42
Averages 32-16 4:1 4-0
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