The buck stops here
29 Sep 2011
MARK KEOHANE, writing in Business Day Sport Monthly, says Springbok rugby must never again lurch from one World Cup campaign to another. It must become a results-driven business with expectation and accountability.
The Rugby World Cup is a tournament that lasts six weeks. It should not be a four-year excuse for any player or coach.
When you read this, South Africa’s fate at the Rugby World Cup could largely be decided. They may be getting close to successfully defending the trophy – or they could be on the brink of packing up and going home.
There will be arrogance among South African supporters. Alternatively there will be denial when there should be insistence that a repeat of the past four years should never again be tolerated, let alone allowed.
The World Cup is undoubtedly the tournament every rugby nation wants to win. The Tri-Nations is a tougher trophy to win but it doesn’t have the global appeal or the romance of the World Cup. It isn’t quite knockout rugby, even though New Zealand has often won the Tri-Nations in a must-win last outing against South Africa or Australia. Everyone seems to forget that because they have blown every World Cup campaign since their successful 1987 tournament.
I don’t understand the view towards the World Cup when it comes to planning and preparation and South Africa is no exception when it comes to putting all the emphasis on the World Cup. It is a tournament that should form part of a four-year cycle. It should not constitute the four-year cycle. Peter de Villiers’ successor should not be judged on whether the Boks win the World Cup in four years’ time. His successor should be judged on how the Boks perform every season, in every Test and in every tournament.
Give the coach a four-year contract, but include performance-based clauses. Make it reviewable after two years. That way the national rugby union is protected, the coach has a form of protection and a responsibility to deliver and no player has the comfort of a four-year cruise because of an affiliation with the incumbent national coach.
Jake White, in succeeding Rudolf Straeuli as Bok coach, gave South Africans a lesson in building a team and the importance of having experience in the change room. But no player can ever be allowed to control the environment in which he plays – and that has been the curse of the Boks in the past four years. Old players, settled, comfortable and calling the shots, do what suits them and what accommodates them. They don’t encourage change, they seldom celebrate the introduction of youth and they grey the area of playing experience and job security.
Whether South Africa win the World Cup or not, South African rugby, to have sustainability, has to have a new approach to the national team, both in terms of expectation and delivery. The expectation has to be that the Boks win every time they play at home and win more than they lose when abroad. Results must be the priority because if a coach has to get results he invariably picks the form players capable of producing a winning sensation. No player is given a four-year guarantee and a 48-month salary advance.
Giving a coach a four-year cycle is an act of suicide if the intent is to evolve and mature into a team of winners. It allows for four years of excuses, either from a coach who supposedly builds in those four years and sees the World Cup as the defining moment of his tenure or it allows for four years of comfort for a coach and players who have no fear of change.
Bok coach Peter De Villiers has convinced himself and a nation that because he put his faith in the 2007 World Cup winners (back in 2008 and again in 2009 and 2010) it was too late to make a change in 2011. He did this because of his shocking results in 2010, when he said that losing in 2010 was a consequence of the grand plan to win in 2011. Other coaches have also used this argument to justify defeats between World Cups.
It is wrong.
Strong leadership is desperately sought within South African rugby to change this mindset. Decisions must be made that make the players and coaches accountable but also ensure that those officials making such massive rugby decisions have to be judged by the
calls they make.
There should never again be a situation when a group of players two years out from a World Cup inform the coach they have a desire to play in the competition and are effectively guaranteed a plane ticket, regardless of form.
There has never been strong managerial leadership within the Boks since White was thanked for winning the World Cup in 2007 and then told to bugger off. Tough selection decisions have not been made because the senior players won’t entertain such behaviour from a weak coaching staff.
The concept of a national selection committee is outdated in a professional environment. Think of the madness. The coach, whose livelihood should be dependent on his team’s results, doesn’t get exclusivity when it comes to selecting his national squad. Two blokes, who have careers outside rugby, make up a three-man selection committee to determine the national squad before every major tournament, be it an incoming series, the Tri-Nations, the end-of-year tour or the World Cup. It is just rubbish and another example of amateur ideals compromising professional principles.
Rugby is a business. Don’t kid yourself that it is a sport, so treat it like a business – and expect those in rugby’s employ to be assessed corporate-style. In business you survive or fall by your decisions, your choices and you are held accountable for those decisions and choices.
Which CEO would survive not investing in a talent like Bismarck du Plessis? He wouldn’t, because shareholders would not accommodate an excuse that the veteran tasked with making the profit would hit his target only every leap year. The board would demand investment in the individual best suited to get results in that year and the demand would be ongoing post every Christmas lunch. A new year would bring a new expectation.
Rugby is a lucrative business for the best players and coaches but it should be accepted that it also ruthless and if the performance does not match the predetermined budgets, that coach and player should be out.
It would also define the type of individual willing to coach the Boks and the kind of player who wants to be part of the Boks. There would be no guarantee of a job if the match returns weren’t proportionate to the salaries being paid.
Think of the financial and emotional investment of the nation when it comes to the Boks. Rugby and government officials implore the average South African to support the team regardless. Forget the make-up of the side, forget how they are playing and forget whom the coach is selecting. Support because you are South African and it is the patriotic thing to do. What crap. Would you invest in a company where government officials urge you not to question the decision-making of the CEO? Would you accept asking a question that involves your investment being dismissed as unpatriotic? I didn’t think so.
The only way to grow our intellect as a nation is for us to debate issues and to educate ourselves that it isn’t a bad thing to ask questions and hold accountable those who survive on supposed patriotism.
If the South African public is the most important shareholder in Springbok rugby there has to be a yearly plan around the team – and this plan includes officials, coaches and players fronting in return for the R450 a person pays to watch a live Test in South Africa, and the huge amounts sacrificed when following the team abroad or purchasing team merchandise.
De Villiers, a week before the Rugby World Cup, did not blink in telling the media that John Smit was the best hooker in the world – and the form hooker of world rugby. Bear in mind Smit did not start against the All Blacks in Port Elizabeth and played only the last 16 minutes. Smit, to his credit, responded by telling the audience his wife also thought he was the best looking bloke around. Everyone chuckled, but imagine if a CEO of a blue chip company made that statement a week before the financials were due to be made public? The share price would drop. Take it as a given.
De Villiers knows Du Plessis is the best hooker in the world. He knows he should be playing him for 80 minutes but he doesn’t know how to negotiate Smit’s role within the team. De Villiers isn’t equipped technically, intellectually or emotionally to make the decisions expected of one in his position.
De Villiers told Butch James he was his starting 10 for the World Cup and that is why he wanted him back in South Africa and not playing club rugby in England. Pressure from within the squad, by seasoned grizzlies who wanted mates selected and deemed themselves to be untouchables, meant James did not start the World Cup at No 10 but was given a bench role as an insurance policy.
The selection of James on the bench, as one example, made very little rugby sense because he offered so little in terms of versatility. The decision to ignore Du Plessis’ form and pedigree was described by international critics as shameful.
I could cite several other examples in the build-up to this Bok World Cup campaign and the campaign proper once at the tournament, but that is not what this is about.
It is about getting it right post-2011 and ensuring the South African rugby public doesn’t get fed propaganda like Smit is the best hooker in the world on form and Bismarck isn’t.
Smit, a wonderful leader of a team who has achieved everything in winning the World Cup, the Tri-Nations and beating the British & Irish Lions, must have cringed at that statement because he knows where he was once the tutor to Du Plessis he is no longer the master.
In this magazine some months ago I made a plea to support Smit’s captaincy at the World Cup and his starting role ahead of the superior playing qualities of Du Plessis. I did it because of the inadequacies of the coach and his assistants.
Smit had to lead the Boks to the World Cup, but that should never have been a guarantee he should lead them in the play-offs at the World Cup. The best should play. The best should always play, otherwise what is the point?
I just watched Wales lose to South Africa in Wellington by a single point after two of their kickers missed a drop goal and penalty within five minutes of the final whistle. To trail Wales by six points on the hour and then pray for their flyhalf to miss a drop goal from straight in front and their goal-kicker to fluff a match-winning kick with three minutes to play couldn’t have been part of the master plan as sold to a nation of Bok supporters.
This is what you were told to invest in and not question.
To watch a coach describe the one-point win as ‘brilliant’ against a nation that has beaten South Africa once in 100 years was embarrassing. To hear him say everything is on track was simply insulting to the intelligence of every South African rugby supporter.
Accountability! It is the missing piece in rugby’s professional puzzle.
De Villiers has had a four-year excuse from the day he got the Bok job. He has done what any coach would do if given such a free ride. I don’t blame him; I blame a system that allows mediocrity to dwarf excellence. And then rewards the non-achievement with a healthy monthly salary.
Watching Du Plessis play against Wales in the final 20 minutes symbolised everything that can be right about our game. Watching him huddled among the substitutes for an hour before that put into perspective just how much is wrong with our rugby.
Who would invest in a company whose board applauds De Villiers and ignores Du Plessis?
South African rugby’s challenge as a company with national commercial and emotional investment has to be to demand excellence every year and not just hope for it in a play-off match every four years.
To reach this rugby nirvana so much has to change about the way those in rugby do business and we as supporters invest in that business.
– This article first appeared in the October issue of Business Day Sport Monthly, which is distributed FREE with the newspaper on the second last Friday of the month.
673 Comments
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29 Sep 2011, 15:40 pm
@Helen(Helen)-447:
Correct, your infact a Mobette.
29 Sep 2011, 15:41 pm
@stormersboy(stormersboy)-442:
he’s got the knives out.
when good lovin’ goes bad.
there is a demi moore ashton kutcher vibe going down here.
with a bit of glenn close thrown in.
If I were heavens game I would be putting my bunnies in the witness protection programme.
29 Sep 2011, 15:41 pm
@Helen(Helen)-450:
lol.
They were all born with bent arms. The Pakastan doctor assured us, so it must be correct
29 Sep 2011, 15:42 pm
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-437:
Apologies if it sounded like I was on a high horse there but I wasn’t.
And I was talking from a supporter’s perspective, results between Cups matter to us. They hurt and they inspire.
Those who claim otherwise just use it as something to fall back on when the AB’s show us their 80% ratio.
Just like AB supporters use their 80% record as a fallback when people point to their RWC failures.
No Bok supporter would trade his RWC victories as it has given us too much in years gone by, similiarly NZ fans wouldn’t trade their record as it has put them at the pinnacle of the Rugby World for much of the Pro Era.
So really there’s no argument here, I respect your record just as you respect our Cup pedigree and we’d both love to improve on our weakness.
@Nils(Nils)-440:
Agree if you do win it, much like the Spanish football team.
And hopefully then it will inspire other teams to match your winning record should you become World Champions.
29 Sep 2011, 15:43 pm
Ok all, have to go. Its 2.43am in the morning and i have work tomorrow.
Night all
29 Sep 2011, 15:44 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-452: It’s a pity ET doesn’t confine his nonsensical cr@p to twitter as well.
At least he’d be limited to short posts.
29 Sep 2011, 15:44 pm
@cab(cab)-350: Alberts will start from bench , he’s missing 40% of his tackles
29 Sep 2011, 15:44 pm
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-453:
are you telling me Richard Hadlee was born in Pakistan?
29 Sep 2011, 15:45 pm
@wpstormerbok(wpstormerbok)-454:
NOhting like a true supporter wpstormer.
We are much alike in the way we think…….sorry about that.
29 Sep 2011, 15:45 pm
@Izwe Lethu(Koos van der merwe)-404:
Is this opinion piece going to evoke even more acts of purification and purgings here on this site.
Be wary of the acts of the rugby hypocrite.
It is just for the game.
And it is only a game and not ever a catharsis.
29 Sep 2011, 15:46 pm
Not much I can say against that article, it just stating the obvious and the known variables in this game
However, Keo seemed to miss the point of the growing 3rd world influence in Test rugby, where one off tests and the winner takes all are the mottos
It’s been a one big yawn so far with the exception of 3 games, big deal
29 Sep 2011, 15:47 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-458:
lol
The best action in the world.
Watch the way he deliveries that ball. No one like it, great slow ball, he could cut of the pitch and swing the ball both ways, shame he a stuck up old fool.
29 Sep 2011, 15:50 pm
@Nils(Nils)-446:
Not the present England team, I was referring to future teams maybe by RWC2015?
But NZ won’t fade it seems as there are already players lining up for McCaw’s jersey.
Slade looks like a good player, reminds me of Merths. But right now having to step into Carter’s shadow must be a daunting task.
29 Sep 2011, 15:51 pm
@stormersboy(stormersboy)-456:
and now he’s found a new chum.
a fellow interweb activist.
29 Sep 2011, 15:52 pm
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-462:
a legend.
one of my all time favourite cricketers.
29 Sep 2011, 15:55 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-458:
I was told he’s the son of an LA *****.
But come to think of it, maybe they meant Lahore.
29 Sep 2011, 15:55 pm
Izwe lethu 404: good piece!
29 Sep 2011, 15:56 pm
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-459:
All good
Regarding the article.
Im still asking where exactly the buck should’ve stopped Keo.
After 2008, Divs 1st year in charge with an away victory in NZ, a poor TriNations overall but ending with a perfect EOYT?
After 2009, 1 of the most successful Bok Seasons?
Or After 2010, after poor results (but take into account injuries to key players, much like NZ in 2009) a year out from the RWC?
Where should the buck have stopped during PDV’s tenure?
Of course the cynical would say before he was even appointed but that’s a moot point really.
Show me where Div should’ve been fired.
29 Sep 2011, 15:56 pm
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-462:
“Watch the way he deliveries that ball” – Hurricane
That sounds so cute
29 Sep 2011, 15:58 pm
@mpundulu(mpundulu)-467:
You would think so.
Problem is, Adriaan Basson isn’t as white as he’ll have us believe.
Inside, his heart is as black as mine.
29 Sep 2011, 16:00 pm
@ET.(ET.)-460:
Wow, that makes less sense than a soup sandwich.
29 Sep 2011, 16:01 pm
” Toks is a rehabilitated racist with no redeeming qualities ”
In the circles of life of the ” arrogant ‘Boer’ ” they like to argue that ” it takes one to know one ” for their powers of reason and persuasion are non-existent really judging by the amount of lying to protect and defend separate development.
Is this then a back-handed, arse-ended admission by paul joseph Gunt Goebbels that he is a ” racist with no redeeming qualities ” ?
Is this as far down the road of purification that he will go?
How genuine a S.African is he if he does not know, let alone grasp, that hairy is really ‘harige’ in his claimed Swiss father’s tongue?
29 Sep 2011, 16:03 pm
@ET.(ET.)-472:
wow! another soup sandwich… but cut into little traingles this time
29 Sep 2011, 16:04 pm
@wpstormerbok(wpstormerbok)-468:
Keo shouldn’t have appointed him coach in the first place.
We need fewer people like keo in this world.
29 Sep 2011, 16:05 pm
@wpstormerbok(wpstormerbok)-463: Maybe 2015. Who knows what they team will look like though – a few Englishmen mixed into SH imports?
I just think it required a Golden Generation to beat the ABs in recent decade, so it’s a helluva task. I do not see that happening in near future, to be honest, unless ABs play utterly poorly.
ABs definitely won’t fade, at least not too much, there have been “dark times” (relative, of course, most other countruies would have died for such a “dark times”). But individuals like Carter or McCaw cannot be replaced easy that’s what makes them so special.
Likewise, Boks will not fade despite politics and other kak. Too much talent and traditions. As long as rugby union lives, Boks will be among the major powers.
29 Sep 2011, 16:10 pm
@Nils(Nils)-475:
Nils, don’t underestimate the devastation if the kiwis don’t win this world cup.
It will do something to their collective psyche.
The future of rugby, however, is in Australia.
They have huge talent, are importing rugby families from SA and NZ and Samoa at a rate of knots and they have the right developement approach
29 Sep 2011, 16:11 pm
@ET.(ET.)-472: A little hint, big fella. Avoid using spaces after (and before) quotation marks. In other words, let the inverted commas nestle nice and tightly against whatever it is you’re quoting.
Yours seem to float mid-sentence, stranded between two bits of text. In a coherent piece of writing, this is confusing enough. But in the written equivalent of a festival toilet tank on day 3, it is damn near impossible to follow.
29 Sep 2011, 16:12 pm
The kiwis have special players in McCaw, Carter, Nonu and SBW, but they have very few special players among the forwards. This is certainly not the best kiwi team in the last decade.
29 Sep 2011, 16:13 pm
Should you not worry about the meat cleaver? Why , I do not really want to know?
Here is a simple solution, take your ‘drol’ from you clearly oversized ‘hol’ and smoke it as a cigar ‘zol’ and soon you will think you are p. Pol.
In case you stupidly wonder, there may well be hallucinatory powers to all the biliverdin, bilirubin, urobilin, stercobilinogen and other existing precursors in your ‘drol’.
See a gastro-enterologist if you have problems with biliverdin reductase and/or biliverdin reductase inhibitor or more.
29 Sep 2011, 16:20 pm
@Helen(Helen)-476: I agree with you, disappointment will be huge in that case. Even bigger than last time although then ABs were clear favourites while not so clear this time after 2 straight losses. So yes, it will be huge. IF.
However, I would not paint biblical plague picture there. Earth will not open up, or mass suicides or trauma forever and stuff like that.
All that would happen is deafening victorious squeal in the media around the world, even their own teams are back home long ago. And I am sure this site, too, will experience a temporary meltdown thanks to gleeful posters.
But I suspect that may happen even if ABs win the cup, as some folks will run for cover.
29 Sep 2011, 16:21 pm
@ET.(ET.)-472:
shut up knobber.
as usual you have the dog firmly by the balls and have given them a good lick.
look seriously, I’m sorry about your split with HG but now fukkoff back to the paddling pool and leave the grown ups alone.
29 Sep 2011, 16:21 pm
Keo is correct. The World Cup is a glamour piece. The Springboks may win the World Cup, but they need to beat the # 1 placed team, New Zealand, to be the Best in the world. Sending B teams to play tests overseas is unpatriotic and disgraceful. The green and gold is sacred. You have to admire the All Blacks for keeping it honest. Cynical strategies are costing us our dignity, and South Africa, now more than ever, needs flag bearers of the highest national integrity.
29 Sep 2011, 16:23 pm
Again we witness the rats escaping from the unknowingly opened cage. Scurrying here , there and everywhere. wanting and seeking their morsel.
My wish is their command, it would seriously seem?
What a feeling. What a powerful feeling.
Sorry ‘boers’ I have little desire nor time to keep you busy. Meeting of the minds at 10.30am EST.
29 Sep 2011, 16:23 pm
@Nils(Nils)-480: lol. Well, if you win you lot will be unbearable. Im taking a 2-week break should that happen.
Call me a chicken, Ill cluck gladly.
29 Sep 2011, 16:25 pm
@Taahirah(Taahirah)-484:
sweet lord.
they are unbearable enough when they lose.
29 Sep 2011, 16:26 pm
481
Gunt, or should I replace the G with the better letter ‘C’, how limp and lame but who would you want me to blame?
29 Sep 2011, 16:29 pm
@Taahirah(Taahirah)-484: Hehe. We both know it’s the truth, the only difference is in case of ABs triumph there will be a few gloaters and a few very happy ones. In case of ABs downfall there will be HUGE number of gloaters and far lesser number of commiserators. I have seen posts straight after Cardiff game, or Super semifinal aftermaths full of obscenities and taunts, I have no illusions whatsoever.
29 Sep 2011, 16:29 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-485:
@Gunther(gunther)-485: It seems your friend @ET.(ET.)-486:
has discovered rap
The Philly freestyler.
Jay-Z should bow down.
29 Sep 2011, 16:31 pm
@ET.(ET.)-486: This is for you:
“My mother said
that I never should
never play with the naughty rude girls in the wood
Their giggling talk I could never understood
And thats why I fell in love with my right hand
(Chorus)
And thats why
I’m a w anker
I’m a w anker
And does it good like it bloody well should
I’m a w anker
I’m a w anker
And im always pulling my pudd”
29 Sep 2011, 16:32 pm
@ET.(ET.)-483:
Are you this painful in person too?
Good grief.
Let go of the dog’s balls and run along to your 10:30 Extra Sensory Titilation meeting of genitals
29 Sep 2011, 16:33 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-485: No need for that really. Otherwise, what’s the difference between Kiwi and Saffa whingeing after losing apart from latter happening way more frequently?
29 Sep 2011, 16:33 pm
@NZINCHINA(NZINCHINA)-441:
@Hurricane(Hurricane)-445:
@NZINCHINA(NZINCHINA)-449:
why would it be so hard to do?
its only 12 games more? we play you two or three time a year so could reasonably peg you guys back over 4 years or so.
29 Sep 2011, 16:33 pm
@Taahirah(Taahirah)-488:
he’s learning to rhyme.
let’s not rush things.
he is to rap what marc lottering is to cage fighting.
29 Sep 2011, 16:34 pm
@Helen(Helen)-490: Ive asked. He assured me that hundreds upon thousands find him interesting.
I took his word for it.
29 Sep 2011, 16:35 pm
“The Tri-Nations is a tougher trophy to win” – keo
yeah right in 2005 jake white won the tri-nations through a LOSER’S bonus point
29 Sep 2011, 16:36 pm
@reechie maak so lank die pan warm, bakkies bring die wors…(i_love_u_bakkiesbotha)-492: You have to start winning at home more than losing, then there is a chance of catching.
29 Sep 2011, 16:36 pm
@stormersboy(stormersboy)-489:
and by ‘right hand’ you mean “thumb and forefinger’, right?
29 Sep 2011, 16:37 pm
@Helen(Helen)-497: he he he tweezers more like.
29 Sep 2011, 16:38 pm
@Taahirah(Taahirah)-494:
hundreds upon thousands of people find penguin mating rituals interesting too.
29 Sep 2011, 16:38 pm
@Nils(Nils)-491:
easy man.
it was tongue in cheek.
@stormersboy(stormersboy)-489:
holihah.
sextrabollocks.
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