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JOHANNESBURG. — One thing that has burned through crystal clear during the build-up week to the return Castle Lager Rugby Championship Test against the All Blacks at Emirates Airlines Park today is that the Springboks have massive respect for their opponents. While the New Zealanders are being disparaged globally, but particularly in their own country, for the poor run of form that has now seen them lose three consecutive matches, the South African team has been very careful not to join the chorus.
At every opportunity in press conferences since the Mbombela Stadium Test where they won by 16 points last weekend, players and coaches have spoken about how hard they had to work to win.
Is it all put on in order to not offer their opponents extra motivation going into a game they so desperately need to win in order to halt the negative momentum in public opinion that is now working against them? Some would suggest it is, but it probably isn’t.
While the Boks were dominant and thoroughly deserved their emphatic victory and could easily have won by more had they made full use of their opportunities, there were times at Mbombela where only desperate scramble defence and New Zealand error prevented the visitors from making an impact even though they had so little ball and territory.
Bok centre Damian de Allende might also have been onto something when he suggested the conditions in Johannesburg might suit the All Blacks better than the relative humidity of Nelspruit.
“It is quite dry up here so the All Blacks won’t disappoint us on on Saturday. Not that I am saying they disappointed us at Mbombela, but the ball was quite greasy there so it was tough for them when they were chasing the game,” said the Bok centre.
De Allende suggested the Boks were pleased to hear the final whistle at Mbombela, and that was the impression gleaned from the press box too. Admittedly the Boks were down to 14 men after the red carding of Kurt Lee Arendse, but before the kick through try to Willie le Roux that ended the game, there was a little momentum on the All Blacks’ side.
Against every other team they play against, the Boks welcome the ally that is the rarified air that brings on the much spoken about altitude effect. But maybe not so much against the All Blacks, who have won games in Johannesburg and Pretoria over the past decade where they just outlasted the South Africans.
It is easy to figure out why this might be. It is down to the tempo that the All Blacks play with, and the Boks too tend to get drawn into a faster game on the quicker surfaces of the highveld. It is a formula that he has applied over the past few years, and last week’s appearance in the starting team was an exception perhaps driven by it being Malcolm Marx’s 50th game, but the swithch of last week’s man of the match back to the bench might be directed around coach Jacques Nienaber’s wariness of a strong All Black finish.
They did it the last time they played at altitude, which was the Pretoria test in 2018. The Boks were more than a score ahead going into the last five minutes but the All Blacks came back to win.
Nienaber has a No. 8 in Duane Vermeulen starting for him today who is as renowned for his ability to play to the ball and dominate the breakdowns as Marx is. Stopping the All Blacks getting quick ball back from the breakdowns will be key throughout the game, but Marx could have a particularly important role to play later when all around him are tired and the All Blacks might be energised and chasing.
On this thread of thinking, it is interesting to note that the Boks have moved away from the tight forward dominated substitutes bench of last week and have instead selected two looseforwards in Jasper Wiese and Kwagga Smith, with lock Salmaan Moerat dropping out. It could be another acknowledgement of the threat the Boks could face late in the game.
It was the forwards that laid the platform for the Bok victory last week, with their pinpoint contestable kicking game and their suffocating defensive effort working off that base. The smart money should be on the Boks dominating the forward battle again, but if some of the passes that didn’t stick at Mbombela do stick at Ellis Park, the All Blacks could be in the game and the Boks will be sucking more of that diesel that lock Lood de Jager spoke about at the start of the week.
That is the danger, and it is a real one, for the All Blacks showed in beating Ireland 42-19 at the start of the recent series in New Zealand that they don’t need to have parity in possession in order to win. They can thrive on less than that.
For them to challenge for a win though will have required good coaching from the All Black staff, for last week they did appear clueless when it came to dealing with the Bok rush defence and their kicking game. You can’t just hope that the X-factor players will pick up the scraps needed for them to have a say in the game, there has to be a plan. And you sense it is the absence of a discernible, workable plan that has precipitated the unhappiness among New Zealand supporters as much as the results have.
Just as the All Blacks spilled balls in the greasy conditions last week, so did the Boks. And as much as the All Blacks may have learned from last week’s defeat, so the Boks would have learned from aspects that troubled them.
For a start, they need to watch their discipline, for it was when they gave away a string of penalties before halftime that the Kiwis started to come into the game.
If the forwards front again like they did last week, the Boks should win, but they will need to be efficient in all areas.
Teams for Emirates Airlines Park
South Africa: Damian Willemse, Jesse Kriel, Lukhanyo Am, Damian de Allende, Makazole Mapimpi, Handre Pollard, Jaden Hendrikse, Duane Vermeulen, Pieter-Steph du Toit, Siya Kolisi (captain), Lood de Jager, Eben Etzebeth, Frans Malherbe, Joseph Dweba, Ox Nche. Replacements: Malcolm Marx, Steven Kitshoff, Vincent Koch, Franco Mostert, Jasper Wiese, Kwagga Smith, Hershel Jantjies, Willie le Roux.
New Zealand: Jordie Barrett; Will Jordan, Rieko Ioane, David Havili, Caleb Clarke; Richie Mo’unga, Aaron Smith; Ardie Savea, Sam Cane (captain), Shannon Frizell, Scott Barrett, Sam Whitelock, Tyrel Lomax, Samisoni Taukei’aho, Ethan de Groot. Replacements: Codie Taylor, George Bower, Fletcher Newell, Tupou Vaa’i, Akira Ioane, Finlay Christie, Beauden Barrett, Quinn Tupaea. — Supersport.com.
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