Preview: Ireland vs Springboks
9 Nov 2012
RYAN VREDE analyses the key match-ups and picks a winner of the year-end tour Test in Dublin.
The optimism among Ireland supporters appeared to be high when I first arrived in Dublin last Saturday, but I’ve since sensed a steady shift to something bordering pessimism, in light of injuries to key and experienced players. They still hope for an Ireland victory, of course, but there is none of the strong belief that had accompanied their ambition in recent meetings at Lansdowne Road.
Ireland have won three of the last four Tests in the city. Experienced and respected men among their media contingent predict that dominance will end, despite acknowledging the Springboks’ own struggles with injuries and their poor form in 2012. I think they’re right, although any Springbok victory will not be accompanied by glowing praise of the beauty of their performance.
The forecast is for cold but clear conditions at kick-off, which will assist the attacking play of both sides, not that either team is likely to thrill in their own territory. The Boks won’t veer from the kick-chase method when in their half, and they will look to put Ireland’s receivers under pressure with committed chasers. The hosts have consistently pointed to the importance of putting their primary punters – Ruan Pienaar, Pat Lambie and Zane Kirchner – under pressure. I don’t foresee them achieving this, with the Springboks’ pack likely to be dominant and in so doing buying the aforementioned players time to set themselves and pick their spots (they’ll target fullback Simon Zebo), whether that be up-and-unders or kicks into space.
Pat Lambie’s tactical game showed improvements in the Currie Cup, but the pressure of Test matches is incomparable and he’ll be under close scrutiny in this regard. Lambie will also be thrust further into the spotlight if the Springboks succeed in pressuring Ireland into penalties in kickable positions. He has kicked superbly of late and needs to replicate that form on the international stage. Certainly if Ireland find their attacking groove they are capable of punishing the Springboks for infringements, with Jonathan Sexton and Ronan O’Gara among the most accurate Test goal-kickers in 2012.
If Lambie wobbles with the boot the Springboks have problems. Statistically no team in the world has spent more time in the opposition’s 22m than they have this year, yet the return in terms of tries scored has been desperately poor. They have consistently conceded penalties or made handling errors when on attack in this zone. There needs to be a dramatic reduction in both counts. The Springboks simply have to be more clinical.
The Bok pack has fronted well in set and general play, even against the All Blacks, who are widely regarded to be the strongest eight in the game. They’ll be too good for the Irish, who’ll miss Paul O’Connell’s physicality and leadership and Sean O’Brein’s industry and potency at the breakdown. If Francois Louw can impose himself at breakdown time (off the back of a good gainline contest) it will further compound Ireland’s attacking struggles. I think he will, with Declan Kidney’s team not possessing enough high calibre strike runners to boss the tackle and render Louw a non-factor.
Expect parity at scrum time, while the tourists will boss the lineouts, where their rolling maul will be a massive weapon.
Overall, Ireland will be a fierce competitor but not one with the quality to take advantage of a significantly weakened Springbok side.
VREDE’S CALL: Springboks by 10
1,019 Comments
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9 Nov 2012, 22:48 pm
@victoriabok-797: what the fck has Stormers got to do with this.. we are talking SA Springbok rugby.. wtf you harping about Stormers for now when its Bok rugby that is at stake here and Heyneke’s holy white arse is on the line.. that should be your first call of concern right now.. not Stormers or AC or wtf ever.
9 Nov 2012, 22:51 pm
@skopdiekan-800: And you are blatantly and totally prejudiced against most of the other bloggers here. Why, and are you proud of this?
9 Nov 2012, 22:53 pm
@Finfan-799: because nowhere else in the world do you find coaches selecting teams based upon ethnicity and favoritism from a prejudiced racially based perspective.. nowhere else only here.
9 Nov 2012, 22:54 pm
@skopdiekan-795: you have problems pal.
why the need to be right?
no one take you seriously in real life?
9 Nov 2012, 22:56 pm
@skopdiekan-803: agreed.
in no other country would a **** like mantashe that fcken loser open his piehole about race in a national team.
only in sa are racist pigs like you and him allowed to spout your k u k all day long because you think it gets you somewhare.
9 Nov 2012, 22:57 pm
to be clear, i called mantashe a k un t.
9 Nov 2012, 22:58 pm
@Finfan-802: nope that is not prejudiced.. prejudice means when you pre judge a person because of your prejudicial presumptuous idea about who that person is.or his capabilities are based on prejudicial racial or ethnic ideology.. that is prejudiced..
I might be a little obnoxious and arrogant and forthright in my statement of opinion.. but that isn’t prejudice.. prejudice we are talking about is racist prejudice which is thick and rife in SA rugby.. so thick and so rife that it is the most hotly debated topic in this sport in this country.. far more so than which strategy works or not.. more about which blue eyed prodigy gets fast tracked before the other.. that is the most pertinent predicament this country’s rugby selectivity finds itself in.
9 Nov 2012, 23:01 pm
@The Rangerman-805: you are a thick bloody idiot you moron and your white idiocy and pseudo enlightened bourgeois intelligence under your inherent racist petticoat is showing so blatantly that you cannot even try and hide your snot nosed little whitey pathetic racist tendencies.. dumb little snooty nosed nat offspring liberal little wannabe.
9 Nov 2012, 23:06 pm
@skopdiekan-807: Yes? You are blatanly prejudiced against all the whiteys here. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, these same whities are exposed to prejudice daily, this even confirmed in legislation.
Don’t feel so sorry for yourself.
9 Nov 2012, 23:07 pm
@The Rangerman-805: if anyone is a pisswilly little fckup piglet its you.. you snot nosed little puffed up piece of pork sausage scurrilous white snooty stuck up scum.
9 Nov 2012, 23:08 pm
@skopdiekan-808: yes yes sadf boy.
are your empty words supposed to make me cringe?
you are the racist pig you swine.
it will get you exactly what you deserve.
9 Nov 2012, 23:10 pm
@skopdiekan-810: some may find this baby talk tourettes amusing.
i dont.
i view it as the childish ramblings of a little boy in an old mans body.
9 Nov 2012, 23:11 pm
@Finfan-809: who is feeling sorry here moron .. certainly not me.. I hear from your post you the one feeling so f’ng hard done by because all your previous one sided bloody privileges are being evened out so you can’t just rough shod rough ride over the indigenous people who you stole their country from under their noses and made them second class citizens in your superficially ingrained racially divided legislation.. you dumb bloody useless self indulgent white blatant thief.
9 Nov 2012, 23:12 pm
@The Rangerman-811: whats that snot nose.. what exactly is it I deserve in your holy white privileged estimation.. little piggy wiglet gone f’ng wrong.
9 Nov 2012, 23:13 pm
@skopdiekan-810: tell me why werent you a conciencious objector mr big mouth?
it seems you are ready to put your fists up anytime anyone disagrees with you but you were too scared to object to hunting “terrs” on the border.
in their own land.
yellow coward swine.
9 Nov 2012, 23:16 pm
@skopdiekan-813: @skopdiekan-814: two posts in a row railing against whiteness
racist pig.
pathetic racist pig actually because you claim to be white haha.
ja right.
its clear you are caught in the middle and arent sure which way to go.
just be yourself man
9 Nov 2012, 23:16 pm
@skopdiekan-767: I go away for 40 minutes to watch Samoa vs Canada and come back to find people apologising to one another? What the hell, is this Keoland or Bizarro Keoland? Next you know people will be using facts and reason instead of insults and accusations. It’s a slippery slope.
Good on you for saying sorry even if it was the most reluctant apology I’ve ever seen in print
9 Nov 2012, 23:17 pm
@The Rangerman-811: racial pig.. swine.. sadf boy… you are an empty little snot nosed little fckwit with a brain the size of a pisswilly little pea.. and you actually think you are in a position of supreme intelligent deduction to assume superiority in terms of your fuckd up upbringing.. you dumb little snot nosed supremacist punk gone absolutely fckd up the wrong way up your white arsed pathetic ingratiated backside.. dumb schmuck deluxe.
9 Nov 2012, 23:18 pm
@gonzo-817: welcome.. any time.. it no skin off my nose to say sorry.. even when I don’t really mean it.
9 Nov 2012, 23:20 pm
@The Rangerman-816: you do not know fckall about what a racist is you little whitearse delusional punk.. you are IT.. and you cannot even see it you miserable little whitey boy indoctrinated skunk.
9 Nov 2012, 23:21 pm
@gonzo-817: who won btw between Samoa and Canada?
9 Nov 2012, 23:25 pm
@skopdiekan-821: It’s early in the second half but samoa scored their first try after 5 minutes and piled a few more on so they’ve got it in the bag.
9 Nov 2012, 23:26 pm
@skopdiekan-813: You are so fcking pathetic. You’ll find reason to feel sorry for yourself even if you were the President and at the same time the Bok coach.
Baby.
9 Nov 2012, 23:29 pm
@The Rangerman-815: were you a contentious objector ?? or were you too young to be conscripted into the army when you turned 17 or 18?
in my day it was nothing to contentiously object to not want to be conscripted into the army.. there were hardly any one contentiously objecting because of their moral principles.. more about their fear for their own safety..
In India under British occupancy the British conscripted local Indian soldiers into the British army who had to enforce British rule law over their own population.. now who was braver.. the soldier who did his duty in the British Raj army or the terrorist who became a renegade and shot at the British?
Lucky for me I never came across any ‘enemy fire’ the closest I ever got to being shot at was from within my own infantry section while dodging elephants on the Angolan border cut line.. lucky enough that was as near to war as I ever got..
9 Nov 2012, 23:31 pm
@Finfan-823: wtf is that supposed to mean.. being the president and the bok coach and feeling sorry for oneself.. wtf you actually trying to say Mr. duality.. what kind of point you trying to put across.. if any?
@gonzo-822: thanks so Samoa driving it home as expected.
9 Nov 2012, 23:38 pm
@skopdiekan-825: You are not only a prejudiced, short-sighted cry baby, but also dumb.
The sad thing is that you believe that you’re intelligent.
Go to be bed or even better, go practice your swearwords on a flipchart.
Pathertic arseh0le.
9 Nov 2012, 23:39 pm
they wanna perpetuate this us and them scenario.. it is so f’ng ingrained inside their lily white heads.. this us vs them delusional fantasy that when somebody call their game up and show them from within that they are NOT the superior self righteous little snot nosed white skin pricks that preposterously think they f’ng special or some such delusional infantile fantasy .. then they wanna scream and shout ‘racist” when the real racist intent and prejudice is rife inside their self righteous indignant little white privileged heads .. thicker than a blanket of outright blinded denial and idiocy.
9 Nov 2012, 23:41 pm
@Finfan-826: come come Mr know all.. what is your definition of prejudice.. come again dumb delusional schmuck.. who is prejudiced here.. hmm.. you or me or who?
9 Nov 2012, 23:43 pm
@skopdiekan-827: Exactly. Now read your post again and see how dumb it actually is. A scream actually, don’t you agree, crybaby?
9 Nov 2012, 23:48 pm
@Finfan-829: who the cry baby.. you the one crying for all your worth that your holy undeserved privileges have become eroded and taken away from you.. who’s crying like a stuck privileged pig who got no privileges to call their own no more.. nope it ain’t me dumb white dumdum.. its you.. that’s who.
9 Nov 2012, 23:49 pm
@skopdiekan-828: Prejudice is blatant anti-sentiment against another group or individual. It is formed by childhood upbringing, life experiences and feelings of inferiority towards the other group. Something you display here constantly. Cry baby.
9 Nov 2012, 23:51 pm
@Finfan-831: nope you got it wrong.. I don’t feel inferior to anybody ever.. but I see a whole lot of white skinned people who still think they got superiority breeding through their self righteous self infatuated racist prejudiced brains.. just like I see straight through you.
9 Nov 2012, 23:51 pm
@skopdiekan-830: like i said, you have problems.
thankfully all i have to do is wander away from my computer and you are as significant as mantashes ( k unt) opinion.
have a pleasant evening snoeky you fckwit haha.
9 Nov 2012, 23:54 pm
@skopdiekan-830: All I’m saying is that white males aren’t made to feel too valued by the people in power, the ones you support. They have even written it into law.
But am I complaining? Not really, just that I can’t understand your victim, oppressed attitude. It is truly pathetic.
9 Nov 2012, 23:57 pm
@The Rangerman-833: You despise Mantashe for telling the coach exactly what he is a white favoritism racist who is favoring and protecting his own lily white baby blue eyed ja baas asslickers and shunning those who are not quite to his white supremacist standing.. you are the dumb white fckwit.. while Mantashe is far more advanced both intellectually and morally and intelligently and ethically than you or Heyneke the sieg heil coach could ever hope to be. Dumbass..
10 Nov 2012, 00:00 am
@Finfan-834: ag white males have it pretty good bud.
imagine living in a dumping ground like most of our population does (mostly black).
too hectic.
its our useless government that i hate, not black people who are pretty awesome considering the plight of many of them.
i blame our government for not alleviating the situation, in fact i hate them for it.
10 Nov 2012, 00:02 am
@Finfan-834: I am no victim.. I’m watching and reveling in the balance of power being shifted because it was far too skewed and one sided desecrated in imbalance for far too long.. its been a long time coming but it hasn’t even started to go right around the merry go round back to go yet… not even close. So in fact you got absolutely fckall to complain about.. you still got privileges heaped in your direction way more than most.. even though you crying like a stuffed pig about the fact that you think its come all the way back to nothing.
10 Nov 2012, 00:03 am
@skopdiekan-835: haha, you think mantashe has any kind of superiority to peddle?
way to discredit anything you have to say.
you think that fat little **** is in any way moral? BWAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
he will fck you up given half a chance.
for 5 bob you fool.
you keep on believing sonny
10 Nov 2012, 00:04 am
@The Rangerman-836: you hate the government so who would you like back in power, the last white minority based garbage riddled self indulgent arsecreeps.?
10 Nov 2012, 00:05 am
@The Rangerman-838: I don’t know Mantashe from a bar of soap.. all I know is he’s cleverer than you.. that why he can tell you where to get off and you can’t tell him the same.. even though you may wanna do.
10 Nov 2012, 00:06 am
@skopdiekan-839: thats a nice assumption boy.
keep making them lets see how far you can stretch your rather limited imagination
10 Nov 2012, 00:07 am
@The Rangerman-836: I agree, that is why I’m not really complaining. However, the white males are certainly not appreciated by those who rule the country. But Skop believes that all white males should be shot. A little too radical, no matter how you look at it. But he is too dumb and prejudiced to realise that the people in power has no reason to feel so sorry for themselves. Real little kiddies.
10 Nov 2012, 00:09 am
@skopdiekan-840: anyone telling me someone is “cleverer” than me is out of their depth.
go to bed pellie.
p.s. i can tell him what i want because we supposedly live in a democracy. you some kind of pinko commie from stalins era or what?
10 Nov 2012, 00:11 am
@The Rangerman-841: who’s your boy you stupid little idiot .. you the baby boy here.. stop fooling yourself dumb little self indulgent ignoramus schmuckass .. you are the boy here, lest you try forget it.
10 Nov 2012, 00:14 am
@Finfan-842: the people in power are exactly the same as the nats.
in fact they learnt most of what they know from the nats.
they should harness the energy of the educated class and use us to uplift the rest. i know i would buy into that.
anyways, the anc have had their chance and their moment has slipped by. they are dinosaurs like every other “liberation” movement and its just a question of how painful removing the leech will be.
my guess, very painful. but if we can hold onto the base of our institutions over the next 4 years whilst that pig zuma feeds off the carcass of sa we will be ok in the long run.
10 Nov 2012, 00:14 am
@Finfan-842: where you get that dumb delusional idea.. who in any far fetched imagination thinks I ever said or wanted all white males should be shot..?? are you insane or something..?? now you see who actually got inferiority complexes oozing out their ears.. its you and this rangerfckwit prude who still think they are different from the greater broad spectrum of humanity..
10 Nov 2012, 00:15 am
@skopdiekan-844: you are my boy.
i cant take anyone who cant communicate properly seriously.
boy.
10 Nov 2012, 00:16 am
@skopdiekan-828:
Leave them skop…they surely aren’t worthy of your magnanimous and certainly insightful views on all things rugby and political.
These fake fans become so damn defensive, even on HM’s behalf where there can be no defense warranted.
The type to find merit against the abolition of separatist regimes with a supplementary condonation for the continued abjection of a blessed people. You try to school them to realise what’s blinding them but they show no appreciation.
So here it is right here…
Fck Megalomania Meyer
Fck his coaching staff
Fck his captain
Fck you if you like him
Fck all o you who think its ok to base your rugby selection opinion on race, size, union or province
10 Nov 2012, 00:17 am
@skopdiekan-846: i may be a fckwit but i am no prude boy.
10 Nov 2012, 00:19 am
@fishdish-848: are you drunk?
no one here is supporting meyer.
btw, i find the fish.
then i use my spear to subdue them.
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