Burger stands tallest
10 Oct 2011
JON CARDINELLI rates the performances of the Springbok players and coaching staff following their unsuccessful World Cup campaign in New Zealand.
Ratings out of 10 are in brackets. The star performers in each category are in bold.
BACKS:
Back three: Frans Steyn (7) started to find some form at fullback before he was asked to step in at No 12. Steyn provided plenty of physicality and impetus in that channel, but his success must be viewed in context considering he played in that position against the minnows. Pat Lambie (7) started the tournament slowly, but delivered his most rounded performance in the quarter-final. Francois Hougaard (7) was the pick of the wings, mixing a mongrel attitude with a phenomenal attacking talent for spectacular individual attacking results. Gio Aplon (7) was similarly dangerous, although wasn’t used nearly enough over the course of the tournament. The two wings who were, Bryan Habana (5) and JP Pietersen (6), were consistently unimpressive. Habana became South Africa’s top try-scorer when he dotted down against Namibia but was otherwise largely ineffective. Pietersen had his moments against Fiji, but also battled to make decisive breaks and finish. Odwa Ndungane (5) looked ordinary even when he started against Namibia. Zane Kirchner is not rated as he didn’t play a game.
Centres: When the World XVs are compiled at the end of this tournament, Jaque Fourie (7) will be up there as the preferred No 13. His value on defence was evident in the first pool match against Wales and again in the quarter-final showdown with the Wallabies, while he combined well with Jean de Villiers (7) on attack in the latter game. De Villiers left the field early on during that Wales game and played off the bench in the Samoa clash, so his rating is largely based on a strong game against Australia. Juan de Jongh’s (6) two-try success against Namibia should be viewed in context, although there’s no denying he has a special talent.
Halfbacks: Fourie du Preez (6) mixed the measured with the erratic, executing well at some stages of the tournament, and missing the mark horribly at others. He looks to be past his best. Ruan Pienaar played so little rugby that it’s difficult to give him a rating. The man who usurped Pienaar in 2009 for the No 10 jersey also didn’t live up to expectations in many respects. Morne Steyn (5) wasn’t as accurate in front of goal as many would have hoped, and his woeful defence allowed opposition teams free passage through the flyhalf channel. He did nail a great drop goal in the quarter-final against Australia, but looking at the Boks’ campaign as a whole, his shortcomings on defence and attack let the team down. Butch James (6) did not get any opportunities at flyhalf, but turned in a solid defensive display at No 12 against Wales.
FORWARDS:
Back row: What better place to announce that you still have what it takes than on the biggest stage of all? Schalk Burger (9) looked the physical, sadomasochistic hulk of old, but also displayed a more subtle side to his game. His role as a ‘distributor’ in games against Wales and Samoa was influential to the outcome, but it was his ball-carrying surges into heavy traffic and some outstanding defensive displays (he made try-saving tackles against Samoa and Australia) that should be duly glorified. Heinrich Brussow (6) made some positive contirbutions without really dominating, as Sam Warburton won the breakdown battle in the big Pool D opener and David Pocock was the more influential openside flanker before Brussow succumbed to injury in the quarter-final. Francois Louw (6) did well when he was called on to deputise for Brussow, while Willem Alberts (7) was explosive in a bench or staring role. Pierre Spies (5) was consistent considering he failed to front for the big matches.
Locks: Victor Matfield (7) ended his illustrious career in terrific fashion. While he had a relatively quiet game against Wales and missed two pool games through injury, he rose to the quarter-final occasion, generating some important lineout steals as an individual and set-piece manager. Danie Rossouw (7) started this tournament strongly, but his overexposure at the top level in 2011 caught up with him in the latter stages. Bakkies Botha (5) never looked like the enforcer of old, while Johann Muller (6) was also limited by injuries.
Front row: Why wasn’t this guy starting? It’s not so much a question asked by myself than a question screamed by hordes of South African and international spectators every time Bismarck du Plessis (7) took the field. Every time Du Plessis came off the bench, he provided the Boks with go-forward. Peter de Villiers will argue that he is an impact player, but the Boks could have used his mobility, hard edge and breakdown skills from minute one. John Smit (5) tried his hardest at this competition, but was a poor impostor of the John Smit of 2007 and nowhere near the Bismarck du Plessis of 2011. Gurthro Steenkamp (6) and Jannie du Plessis (6) scrummed well, although the latter struggled in open play. The prop with the strongest game in general play, Beast Mtawarira (6) received few opportunities, as the Bok coaching staff favoured the superior scrummager in Steenkamp. CJ van der Linde (6) offered good impact from the bench, while Chiliboy Ralepelle (6) made the most of the few minutes he was given against Namibia during the pool stage.
COACHING STAFF:
Head coach: As the lengthy list of Bok assistants and consultants will show, Peter de Villiers (4) did not go to the World Cup to contribute in the technical department. From a management point of view, the senior players loved their coach because he allowed them carte blanche. He didn’t have the balls to make the tough calls when it came to selection, particularly in the areas of flyhalf and hooker. This weakness cost the Boks big.
Forwards coach: The forwards performed strongly at this World Cup, although the selection of Smit did undermine their cause at the breakdown. Gary Gold (6) did a solid enough job, but it must also be noted that he worked closely with Rassie Erasmus and veterans like Matfield in formulating the forward battle plans.
Backs coach: What has Dick Muir (2) contributed to the Bok game in the last four years? At the beginning of the 2008 season, he convinced De Villiers to favour an all-out approach that shunned structure, and when the players overturned this decision and reverted to what worked in 2007, it was almost as if Muir lost interest. In 2011, the Boks had a defensive coach, a kicking coach and a technical analyst to aid their backline’s development, and in areas like kicking and defence, there was a notable improvement. What failed to evolve was the Boks’ attack, as the poor try-scoring record will show, and Muir must shoulder some of the blame for the backline’s gross underachievement.
219 Comments
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10 Oct 2011, 13:50 pm
MITCHELL MITCHELL GIVE IT TO MITCHELL
10 Oct 2011, 13:52 pm
@Sasuke(Sasuke)-48: Excluding overseas players is a nonsense of the highest order.
10 Oct 2011, 13:53 pm
btw which of these keo ******* helped with butch’s autobiography??
10 Oct 2011, 13:53 pm
Gold and Muir need to be sent to Rugby purgatory… forever.
10 Oct 2011, 13:54 pm
M O N K E Y S is a censoured word on KEO hahahahahaha
10 Oct 2011, 13:55 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-54: agree send them to build zimbabwes team for the world cup in 2050,they are kak.
10 Oct 2011, 13:55 pm
@seabiscuit(seabiscuit)-53: Who the **** cares. It is a book I will never read and I recommend to anyone with half a brain never to read either.
10 Oct 2011, 13:56 pm
@seabiscuit(seabiscuit)-51: no we need him with the lions ,u can have plumtree
10 Oct 2011, 13:57 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-57: so u are saying that peter div will read it?
10 Oct 2011, 13:57 pm
@Duke01(Duke01)-56: Poor Zimbabwe. No.
10 Oct 2011, 13:57 pm
@seabiscuit(seabiscuit)-55: no it is not,u can say blue bulls here
10 Oct 2011, 13:58 pm
@Duke01(Duke01)-58:
im gatvol of plum i mean who in their right mind would actually ever play bosman, he is in the useless catagory along with habana and spies
10 Oct 2011, 13:58 pm
@Sasuke(Sasuke)-48:
What about Juan Smith?
10 Oct 2011, 13:59 pm
@David(David)-42:
Your mom should have called you Mielie…
10 Oct 2011, 13:59 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-60: sorry ,i mean congo
10 Oct 2011, 14:00 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-52: It was just to highlight what talent we have at home. I will obviously include F.Steyn on any run on team.
10 Oct 2011, 14:01 pm
@seabiscuit(seabiscuit)-62: but he will hear what mitchel have to say,not like the others
10 Oct 2011, 14:01 pm
@Duke01(Duke01)-59: Any dumbfck who will actually buy it, probably deserves it especially in light of:
- keo.co.za’s naked promotion of Butch over M Steyn during RWC 2011
- guaranteed non-literary merit
- the author is no John Carlin (Invictus)
- the subject, as much as I like him, is no Bok great.
10 Oct 2011, 14:02 pm
@toothgnasher(toothgnasher)-63: If he is up to playing international test rugby then yes i will include him in that squad. He is a fragile case….one more concussion and his career is over.
10 Oct 2011, 14:02 pm
@Sasuke(Sasuke)-66: And Flo? He was excellent yesterday. He will be playing at Bath.
10 Oct 2011, 14:02 pm
@Duke01(Duke01)-67:
sory u lost me man, wat u talking bout?
10 Oct 2011, 14:04 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-70: Also Sarel Pretorius must be given a Bok jersey if only to scupper any faint chances of Wallaby representation.
Its called looking after Numero Uno – the Bok.
10 Oct 2011, 14:15 pm
Plumtree at the Sharks must be made to play Lambie at 15 from now on.
10 Oct 2011, 14:19 pm
same dumb fck hero worshiping that cost us this WC they still wanna carry on praising Schalk Burger to the rooftops when its same Schalk Burger that cost us the 1/4 final by his dumb fck move of going to ground in front of hid posts and not securing ball gifting Aussie their only try. Rest of game he tackled everything that moved but also fckd up momentum by playing fly half entire game so no hope of any tries coming from our side. Rassie f’ng enterprising rugby of filling backline with forwards to stuff up any chance of any momentum development in backline with a SLOW FdP stuffing up the rest.
Get rid of ALL these palookas , entire JW team and start again, that’s the way forward.. Complete fresh start sweep clean from bottom to top all the way through.
And stop making hero’s from f’ng villains like Smit FdP Burger and the rest, next they touting Burger for next captaincy, biggest mistake they could make.
10 Oct 2011, 14:20 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-70: Yes Flo was very good yesterday. i would first look at what is available at home. There are lots of young openside flankers coming through the ranks.
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-72: Sarel Pretorius is already in his late 20′s and is a liability on defence. Rather develop a younger scrumhalf like Hoffman or Duvenage.
10 Oct 2011, 14:25 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-73: Yes. I am not a big fan of Lambie but he impressed me yesterday in the 15. That is his future. We are well covered otherwise at Flyhalf with Morne Steyn, Elton Jantjies, Johan Goosen, Gary van Aswegen, Lionel Cronje all coming through nicely.
10 Oct 2011, 14:32 pm
@Sasuke(Sasuke)-75: Yeah, Hoffman may be a good one.
And may we never, ever hear “we’re building for the RWC”… An 80% win record by year 2 should be the goal of the new coach.
10 Oct 2011, 14:33 pm
@Alucard I concur, herery, herery.
The players gave a performance that the Ozies could do nothing to but defend. It was very very fustrating game to watch from a Springbok point of view. Our Problem and our only problem— could not execute, could not put in the finishing touch.
DePreez knock on at goal line time, Burger loosing the ball at goal line time, isolated backs come breakdown time. With that performance, bar finishing touch time, we should have won that game by 30 points easily.
Did we panick a bit come executing the last move, or was the Wbs defense really that amaising? I would say both. I think executing the last move has been a problem for yrs for us.
So we point at the coaches because they ( PdV then chooses his 2nd 3rd coach) are to be blamed. But hold on, they were racially selected, so I wont even blame them.
So we Fully blame the Govt and SARU who forced SARU to performed bullshite racist motives.
And may they cop on to the fact that transformation is racism. You cant force people to play a game they dont want to, nor you cant force selection of a race over another and call yourself liberal. That is very far from a rainbow nation, what does Mandela think? PdV(the poor escape goat used) is a perfect example of the Govt doing the dirty and look what happened.
A perfectly nice person, whom people cant imagine if they placed their feet in his shoes and were offered the job, (hell i would have taken the job), is seen as,.. well everyone has their thoughts on him.
… and i could go on about them….£$^&%.
The Abs can only be stoked we are knocked out, we would have, could have’s, but’s , if’s…. etc, ahh it’s fustrating…….
There was no stoping the Green machine to the final, no way in hell, if’sbut’scouldhave’s we knew how to execute the final move.
A young inexperiened side were able to stop us………………….
Lets stand up to all this transformation racist Govt bullshite, and say no more.
We want our history back, the part of history where we were the most dominent rugby team for 50 yrs. Thats what we want back. We want back out win record over the Abs back to what is was,… in the 60% plus. Thats who we were lets bring it back.
I sleep, breath and **** rugby thats because rugby runs in my veins and its been running in my my veins for a very long time, a 111 yrs to be exact.
10 Oct 2011, 14:34 pm
How do you only give Bismarck du Plessis a 7 – more like 11 or 12. In the push of the scrum, in foraging and fetching in the rucks and mauls, driving and tackling and ingredient X stuff (like his charge down against the Wallabies that nearly gave a us a try), and “impact” impact, inspiration to his comrades, uncanny levels of anticipation, du Plessis was so far ahead of any other hooker you’ve ever seen – all the top boys say this: Sean Fitzpatrick, Keith Woods to name a few … where do you get 7 from? The man is one-off freak of nature and deserving of the adjective ‘genius’.
10 Oct 2011, 14:38 pm
How’s this for an out of the box thought:
Bismarck as the next Bok Captain ?
10 Oct 2011, 14:40 pm
@Greenies(Greenies)-78:
Which 50 years was that?
10 Oct 2011, 14:45 pm
In a game of inches I spotted one big selection error.
Beast not on the bench.
He would have been very useful the last 10 mins.
10 Oct 2011, 14:47 pm
if Bismark and Alberts would have started and Louw and Aplon come on 2nd half and Hougaard to scrummy ahead of FdP Boks would still be in the competition I’m 99.5 % sure
10 Oct 2011, 14:54 pm
@ashampoopaloo(joel1yahoo)-83: Disagree in everything except Alberts.
Louw played brilliantly, for sure, but no-one was to know that he was anything other than an insurance policy.
But now we all know how well he can play at the highest level. He and Brossouw must fight it out next year for the openside position.
10 Oct 2011, 14:56 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-80:
computer says no.
after his petulant display against the all blacks in pe that guy has no business captaining a rowboat.
let alone the boks.
schalk it is.
10 Oct 2011, 14:56 pm
They are still losers – ratings mean nothing – winning is winning
10 Oct 2011, 15:00 pm
@stew(stew)-86:
shut it twatstick.
players get ratings all the time.
win or lose.
10 Oct 2011, 15:04 pm
Beast and Bismark were sacrificed for John Smit, neither Butch nor CJ nor Aplon were used off bench though we couldn’t score a try in 80 min with all the midfield ineffective carrying of Burger, Roussow, Matfield, Spies and JdV who was the only one making inroads through defences.
Hougaard should have played 9, Aplon should have come on for Habana, Louw for Brussow, Bismark and Alberts should have started Beast and Smit and Spies and FdP off bench, and ONLY used if they were needed. Gurthro and Jannie played entire 80 mins – Steenkamp was my MOM he put it all out there all 80 min long, but fresh Beast would have made impact.
Smit cost Boks this WC, I said it over two years ago that was the single catalyst gonna do the damage and so it has, now its come to pass and they still dunno WTF actually happened, when all they gotta do is face facts. Smit happened that’s why they couldn’t beat Aussie in 6 from 7 starts and the one they did win was at Loftus where Smit departed and left Matfield Beast and Bismark to close out the game.
Chili would have been better sub to Smit, Bismark should have started with Chili and Beast off bench.
Can’t cry over spilled milk but that’s what fckd Boks WC campaign, J. Smit, and secondly Spies and FdP, look no further than that.
10 Oct 2011, 15:07 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-85: Fair enough. It was an “out there” question.
I think of Schalk similarly especially after seeing his Sulk Burger display in the Currie Cup final 2010.
I suspect he will be a mistake of huge proportions as Captain of the Boks.
.
10 Oct 2011, 15:11 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-89:
Be that as it may, I can’t see them looking past him.
he was basically captaining the team against Samoa already whilst big vic just stood there and platted his beard.
10 Oct 2011, 15:13 pm
@ashampoopaloo(joel1yahoo)-88: I think people need to see your rugby opinions for what they are:
- repetitive
- bitter shitstirring
- minimal validity
- hypocritical
Your views on life can be a laugh a minute and your re-envisioned English language hilarious, but on rugby – nothing but spilled grains of salt to be flung over the shoulder.
10 Oct 2011, 15:17 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-85: I think Bismark is a great Hooker, but he is by no means captain material. Anyone that watches “Boer soek vrou” Cannot ever be a rugby national team captain.
10 Oct 2011, 15:17 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-90: Yeah maybe. But there is a degree of petulance that will not help the Boks get to an 80% win ratio which should be the goal from now on.
Maybe Schalk has improved since 2010 as a leader. I hope so if he is to be made Captain.
10 Oct 2011, 15:21 pm
@rossoneri(rossoneri)-92:
watch it?
I’m suprised he wasn’t in it.
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-93:
I don’t see schalk as petulant at all.
He played that game with broken ribs if I remember.
I like a skipper who leads from the front.
10 Oct 2011, 15:21 pm
@rossoneri(rossoneri)-92: Just like anyone who supports the AB’s over the Boks in the present day does not deserve to call themselves a true South African.
10 Oct 2011, 15:24 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-77: Agreed. The coach must get a two year deal with the option to extend another 2 years.
10 Oct 2011, 15:27 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-94:” Pump by die dam pump”
…..I am surprized too. Maybe next season we’ll see him feature. Not that I have any idea how they find wifes for these farmers.
10 Oct 2011, 15:27 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-94: If you haven’t seen schalk being petulant on the field then you might be blinding yourself to his failings.
I too like a skipper who leads from the front, but I would also like a skipper not to put his fingers in opposing players eyes in the heat of the moment…
Corne Krige was also a skipper who “led from the front”…
10 Oct 2011, 15:28 pm
@Heavens Game(Heavens Game)-84:
You forget his 2 MOMs.
10 Oct 2011, 15:28 pm
@Gunther(gunther)-90: Vics beard looked very glossy and shiny yesterday. Must be using a new shampoo.
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