Does anyone remember South Africa vs Fiji tied 20 all after 60 minutes in the 2007 Rugby World Cup Quarter Finals? No because we got the job done and ran away with it in the last 20 minutes before hoisting the Webb Ellis Cup. Today’s match against Scotland was the same, it was a grind with aspects of the match not going our way but we managed to pull away when needed. Scotland was a potential banana peel for the Boks as a win today almost guaranteed a quarterfinal but a loss meant the results had to go their way even with a good showing against Ireland. This was no cupcake match against a non tier 1 nation, Scotland was both prepared and motivated.
Credit goes to Scotland for trying to take away some of the traditional strengths of the Bok team by varying the attack to nullify the suffocating defense and muddying the set pieces to limit clean ball. When comparing the quality of ball South Africa had in their final warm up game against New Zealand and this game was chalk and cheese with every ruck a mish mash of bodies. This was by design as the Scots knew clean ruck ball for the Boks would spell the end for them. Other coaches will be looking at this game with interest as the impenetrable Boks showed some chinks today which could be exploited with the right match 23. The key here is the emphasis on 23 as the bomb squad was a cluster bomb for the beleaguered Scots as a trio of scrum penalties for Ox Nche against Souths Africa’s 9th best tighthead WP Nel meant we could lean on field position until the dam finally broke.
The South African brains trust of Rassie and Jacques will both be letting out a sigh of relief for a game with no major injuries (Eben Etzebeth’s injury unknown) and no sightings (Jessie Kriel will be sleeping with a rabbit’s foot under his pillow for his clumsy tackle). However that relief will quickly dissipate come tomorrow as they will need to answer some urgent questions on a reliable kicker, sloppy scrummaging technique and poor set piece execution. Manie is a confidence player and when is on song he looks like a Netflix NFL quarterback waiting to happen but his fragility off the kicking tee is alarming. History tells us that you can’t win multiple knock out matches without having a reliable kicker and with all honesty he isn’t reliable. They will have to make the decision soon as to who will be the number no.1 kicker going forward because if it is Faf he will need some time in the saddle before he can win a match with his boot. The management team pride themselves on honesty with the players so they will need to be upfront about how they want to handle the no.1 kicker discussion. In open plan Manie is a delight to watch but certainty is needed as to who will carry the pressure of kicker. I am no expert in the dark arts of scrummaging so I give my best analysis of why we looked out of sorts in the first half. Frans Malherbe seemed too far away on engagement negating his weight advantage on the hit and could never get his feet underneath him to get the shove on. Was this Pieter de Villiers (Scotland scrum coach) magic or a mistake on our part as the front row of Scotland rarely sends shivers down the spines of any international pack. Daan Human for the Springboks is an out and out technician in the scrums so I expect no stone to be left unturned before the next big match. I think of the magical try Malcom Marx scored against the All Blacks of the peel around maul as to the height of set piece execution but when I look at today’s performance the set piece sputtered for most of the match. Dropped balls, players missing one on one assignments and a general lack of crispness all played into an overall sloppy set piece performance. Credit must go to the Scots for disrupting the Boks plans but sterner tests await this team and they will need to be better.
All in all a pretty uninspiring performance but all that matters is 1-0 in the win column with a bag full of positives before some stern tests. This Bok team has shown resilience in the past and it has no reason to believe this World Cup could not be theirs for the taking. It is a deep pool filled with many sharks circling the title holders but nothing great was ever achieved easily.
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