Hougaard yearns for scrumhalf return
22 Nov 2012
Francois Hougaard says he is better suited to scrumhalf than wing and admits to feeling like he is stalling Lwazi Mvovo’s Test career.
In a refreshingly candid interview, Hougaard, who started the Test season as Heyneke Meyer’s first-choice scrumhalf but was later shifted to wing, spoke about his positional preference, his form and his feelings on Mvovo’s plight.
Hougaard shone for the Bulls in 2009 and 2010 on the wing, but struggled to make the transition back to scrumhalf (where he’d played most of his career) when Fourie du Preez moved on. This season was one of adjustment, painful at times, as Hougaard battled to come to terms with the tactical demands of the Bulls’ game plan, particularly the kicking disciplines.
Those struggles carried over into the Test arena, before he was finally replaced by Ruan Pienaar for the Rugby Championship. Yet Heyneke Meyer still placed high value on his game-breaking ability and accommodated him on the wing.
Asked to assess his season, Hougaard said: ‘I haven’t been happy with my form. I’m still learning a lot at scrumhalf, but I haven’t played much there. I still train there everyday, but you only get better if you play. I still think that’s my best position.
‘In the long run I’m a scrumhalf. I want to settle in one position or I run the risk of being an average wing and an average scrumhalf. I don’t want that to happen. I know I have so much to work on at scrumhalf, but I’d prefer to cover scrumhalf from the bench for the Springboks [in 2013] if it means I’m not thrown around positionally [scrumhalf at the Bulls and wing with the Springboks].’
With the reduced time and space on offer in Test rugby [compared to Super Rugby] and greater analysis available on him after his impressive cameos off the wood as a wing in 2011, Hougaard has yet to entrench himself in the position. There are mitigating factors, among them the Springboks’ inability to engineer opportunities for him. Hougaard, however, refused to look beyond himself for blame, and continued with a startling admission.
‘The coach plays me ahead of Lwazi on wing, but I feel for him. I would understand and support the decision to play him ahead of me,’ he said. ‘It feels unfair to me because I’m playing in his position and not doing that well. Its easy to tell the guys to keep themselves up on a three-week tour, where they sit on the bench or never play. It’s not nice and not easy, I’ve been there. But I’m here now and I have to take the chance. I’m working hard every day to improve.’
409 Comments
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23 Nov 2012, 09:39 am
Hopo = hope
23 Nov 2012, 11:09 am
@cab-304: Nicely handled, Cab.
I saw the discussion last night but was too tired to join in to assist you against a New Ager and a Creationist, both of whom’s knowledge of how science works and the details of evolution (the latter confuses abiogenesis with evolution) would combined fit on a postage stamp.
23 Nov 2012, 11:30 am
@Brendope-197: You’re out of line!
23 Nov 2012, 11:43 am
@mikeybrass-352:
Another high priest who thinks it has the keys to the kingdom of knowledge, you don’t your academic education is most certainly not knowledge, it is inaccurate information which you parrot learn and then pass it off as knowledge. None of you high priest disciples have any access to knowledge you only have access to other peoples assumption about how life or the universe works. Your information is firstly flawed and secondly you cannot access knowledge by way of your academic learning.
secondly your assumption about what you refer to as a new ager when yours is actually the new age religious ideology that is propounded as knowledge. Yours is the new age religious nest of delusion, you have not scratched at the surface of what knowledge is because your head is filled with rhetorical importance of what you think your intellect has learned.
23 Nov 2012, 11:54 am
@skopdiekan-354: If you’re such a tra-la-la hey showow spiritualist, when is the last time you took a vow of silence? Aren’t you long overdue?
23 Nov 2012, 11:56 am
@Dawn-349:
Far better to know F’ALL these new age religions that pretend to know anything know less then F’ALL, sooner they realize how little they know the sooner they be in a position to learn the beginning of what knowing actually consist
23 Nov 2012, 11:57 am
@Marty-173: Im so sick of that “light” way of thinking.
Who misses tackles? Often its the “big boys” like Kirchner, JPP, Mvovo has been guilty and Taute was guilty too.
Now I know experience counts and so on, but so does heart, courage and technique.
How many times has Aplon missed a tackle? VERY few. Even if he hangs on and slows him down, he always gets the guy.
De Jongh is an amazing tackler, the examples are numerous.
23 Nov 2012, 12:02 pm
@katman-355:
What you doing here punky boy who invited you to the discussion? don’t you know where you belong, certainly not among anyone interested in the discovery of knowledge that for sure.
Move along, you out of place go preen your dumb self deluded ignorant feathers some other place
23 Nov 2012, 12:02 pm
@Hurricane-185:
1. I never blamed Bryce in my post above. Dont assume.
2. No, we will never know. Like we will never know about RWC 2007 – vut that didnt stop the Kiwi mafia (and I remember you in particular posting) how “lucky” the Boks were not to pay NZ in the final and so on.
3. Carter was out, NZ were down to their 3rd or 4th Flyhalf.
McCaw was on 1 foot.
Boks had won the previous Test between the 2 teams.
The pressure of a semi against the Boks wouldve crumbled the team (just see how the ABs sh@t themselves in the final against France).
Wallabies do not mentally trouble the ABs. But the BoOks do, and wouldve on that day of the semi.
I believe the Boks wouldve won the semi.
Based on France’s performance in the final (even tho the ref was so biased against them) I am less sure that we wouldve won the final!
23 Nov 2012, 12:04 pm
@TooMuchRugby-155: No worries man – I was more emotional yesterday after reading so much negativity
Dont be negative about the coach – he is slowly coming right. Support him rather
23 Nov 2012, 12:07 pm
I agree with Houggie 100%.
23 Nov 2012, 12:09 pm
@skopdiekan-358: Hey! wys ‘n bietjie respek vir die Katman. Hy is ‘n senior lid van hierdie blog.hy poste met kennis en insig, terwyl jou gedigte vol vloekwoorde en beledigings is net laf en waardeloos – al laat hulle my lekker lag soms met hoe laf hulle is
23 Nov 2012, 12:18 pm
@bokfan1-359:
Ok well you hold onto that belief because i believe ABs would have won
But its all over and if the boks did make it through to the final, france would have beaten them.
23 Nov 2012, 12:21 pm
@Hurricane-363:
2011 RWC.
NZ …………………………..1st.
SA…………………………….8th=
Let’s all move along.
23 Nov 2012, 12:23 pm
So another player has come out and publicly declared himself to prefer another position. Jislaaik, did we ever get these public outcries in Pdivvy’s reign? Heynecke is a terrible man manager.
23 Nov 2012, 12:27 pm
Also I’ve disliked Hougaard at scrumhalf since I saw him way back in the u20 tournament. Had a shocker with his passing and kicking in e game we got knocked out. And he hasn’t improved those skills at all.
Can see how he’d want to play 9 as he’d be far more involved. It I do think he’s best in broken play and would make a much better wing or centre. I’d prefer if we maximized his talents rather than play him in a position where he lacks the basic skills. And this isn’t even a criticism of the boks gameplay. I believe even if we played an expansive game his passing and kicking would be an issue.
23 Nov 2012, 12:29 pm
Oh Skop, do yourself a favour and introduce yourself to the science section of a library. Just because you can type and speak doesn’t make anything you say about academic and science fact *shrugs*
23 Nov 2012, 12:30 pm
@mikeybrass-367: academic – academia
23 Nov 2012, 12:35 pm
@skopdiekan-358: I just like to give you the odd poke, because that’s all it takes for you to then show everyone what a complete arrogant, self-deluded, tactless poepol you are. I consider this part of my civic duty. So don’t expect it to stop.
23 Nov 2012, 12:50 pm
@katman-369:
23 Nov 2012, 13:22 pm
@bokfan1-362: dis eintlik die probleem met julle dom ontkenners wat niks werd weet
julle bly besef dat die doose wie dink hulle die lang termyn lid van die heilige blog byeenkoms weet wat die fok gaat aan in die lewe wanneer die egte saak van die spel is hulle weet minder as fokol.. net soos jy.
23 Nov 2012, 13:39 pm
@mikeybrass-367: academia and science are seeking some answers to the riddle of life and existence in this anthropological jig saw puzzle tale of deluded darwinian foolishness
the reason you are unable to find any clear direction as to who you are and what your actual relationship is with the source of your human heritage is because you are looking in the wrong frame of reference
I’m not knocking academia purely for the sake of it, it has its place in human evolution and evaluation as to defining mans evolution through this creation, except that the level of authenticity your high priests of learning place on the scant little bit of incomplete knowledge you hold up as gospel truth shows that your halls of intellectual evaluation have not even begun to know who man actually is or what the purpose of your sojourn through this creation is.
So even if you attempt to pursue this false idea of what you reckon comprises knowledge through your entire life your search for clues to reality will be in vain.. as every academic will attest to this unequivocal fact.
Therefore if it is knowledge you truly seek, then you are seeking in the wrong place. if it is more riddles to less understanding to further baffle your already baffled mind you wish to confuse yourself further with, then by all means continue to waste your time going around in academic circles of delusional non knowing half baked theories and incomplete thesis’s on who these non knowing high priests put forward as vague possibilities.
Either you seek knowledge or you seek clues to bolster your new age religious denomination of self made intellectual delusion, that only the individual can decide, but most of you so called academic scientists are not true scientists in the true sense of the discipline.. If you were you would know you know absolutely nothing, and you would venture to seek to know from someone who actually does know what you don’t.
23 Nov 2012, 13:52 pm
@katman-369: you are actually the little self delusional arrogance endowed idiot that thinks he knows whats cutting about his ears.. you are the one here that needs the lesson of humility stuffed through your pompous little non knowing snout.. you want to keep getting your frivolous little non knowing teeth kicked through the back of your frivolous pompous non knowing head.. keep trying to show what a pompous little stupid ignoramus imbecile you actually are.
23 Nov 2012, 13:55 pm
@skopdiekan-372:
For what it is worth, philosophy has its place. It does not however tell me how to examine a burial cemetery thousands of years old to assist in determining the social organisation of the society. It does not help me re-evaluate a pottery assemblage. It doesn’t help me AMS date artefacts. It does however help me with musings over constructing appropriate models of human behaviour and thinking about ways in which it is reflected, inverted and contradicted in what remains in the archaeological record.
23 Nov 2012, 13:58 pm
@skopdiekan-373: 100% bek, fokkol% binnegoed.
23 Nov 2012, 14:09 pm
@skopdiekan-356: Skop, the whole point of being a scientist is the curiosity of investigation, finding out something knew. It’s the love and thrill of it, and it is one helluva ride.
23 Nov 2012, 14:11 pm
@mikeybrass-374: what we are discussing is knowledge or the lack thereof…
philosophy is not knowledge as much as physical scientific data is also only a means to a construct of what the human intellect will try and decipher or derive historical information to formulate a best guess idea at who his ancestors or heritage were and with such incomplete means attempt to try and construct a relevant story book of intellectually evaluated so called truths or facts.
One can either go about picking at samples of scattered data across eons of scant incomplete fossils of information and attempt to build a best guess construct at who you are, or you can go to the source of where your heritage stems from and short circuit all this mesmerizing incomplete data and tune in or plug into the direct means for discovery and accessible evaluation.
One form of experience and evaluation is a true science while the other is not. Now the real question of the exercise is who determines what is true from false?
You out in the periphery of physical materialist enterprise are unable to determine what is true from false, while it is these very same high priests of material so called reality who have not breached the constraints of their own intellectual academic making which is rigidified systems of lack of any true scientific knowledge, and yet they will be the first to declare with full force of conviction that they with all their half baked guesswork scattered along their path of incomplete synopsis at who they think they are to be the custodians of knowledge when the reality of it is they are most definitely not.
23 Nov 2012, 14:20 pm
@katman-375: no you the idiot arsehole that knows absolutely fckall and pretends you such a whizkid of fokolheid.. you stupid ignorant little dumb fck self deluded drek garbage nonentity of absolute nothingness.
@mikeybrass-376: yip I understand that, it is thrilling to discover new boundaries to new ideas and new questions of self discovery..
My point is the real avenue to discovery is far more pertinent and exact to the point of what true knowledge is about, it is discovering the real workings of nature within avenues of what comprises true understanding of who you the human individual is.. going around in circles for lifetime upon lifetime of attempting to uncover data out in the physical realms of nature by definition cannot ever come to a complete understanding of who you are, by following Socrates ‘philosophical’ injunction about who the human creature is and the means by which to unfold this discovery, is a far more accurate and direct purpose of evaluation and discovery to the source of the question any true scientist should be asking himself.
23 Nov 2012, 14:21 pm
@Hurricane-363: Exactly. In the same way you believe it about 2007 with no evidence or basis to believe it, so do I believe it about 2011 – with some supporting evidence at least.
Lastly – you then make a statement that “france would have beaten them” – as if this is a fact. So its ok for you to do it, but not for others?
@cane-364: Those are the official standings and a fact. No one is disputing that cane. everyone has moved on, like kiwis need to move on from 2007
23 Nov 2012, 14:26 pm
@skopdiekan-371: Hahahaha dit was n goeie een – ek lag lekker.
Ontspan die boude ou maat, ek weet nie wat die mensdom aan jou gedoen het nie, maar dit moes wreed gewees het om jou so kwaad te maak.
Dis somer in Suid Afrika, dis Vrydag, die Bokke speel. Jy gaan braai en lekker kuier. Geniet die lewe en moenie so aangaan nie.
23 Nov 2012, 14:34 pm
@bokfan1-380: jy’s n goeie kerel.. jy begin besef wat eintlik die dringende oplossing van die mensdom se lewe en gesieende uitkoms is.. dis braai, rugby, bier, vrou mens vry en lekker lag
gaat so aan, jy’s op die regte pad.
23 Nov 2012, 14:37 pm
@skopdiekan-381: En natuurlik Chevrolet.Hello Skop.
23 Nov 2012, 14:41 pm
eks nou uit
lank genoeg om die domheid van die genade skade te probeer verlig
tosiens vir nou
23 Nov 2012, 14:42 pm
@ryecatcher-382: hello koebaai.. nuther lesson next time.. ciao
23 Nov 2012, 14:43 pm
@skopdiekan-381:
What is best in life?
To crush your enemies, to see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.
23 Nov 2012, 14:44 pm
@skopdiekan-381: Dankie man! Nee wat, ek se nie dis die oplossing nie, bedoel maar net ons moet die lewe bietjie geniet juis omdat daar so veel strond in die wereld.
Moenie met jou medemens en mede-Springbok-ondersteuners so baklei nie.
Ek moet se – jy skryf nogal mooi, in Engels ook #377 is welsprekend geskryf.
Gebruik daai talent vir goeie diens en baklei met die Kiwis
23 Nov 2012, 14:45 pm
@WP-Forever-385: Nice quote! Was it Genghis Khan?
23 Nov 2012, 14:57 pm
@bokfan1-387: It is a good quote.Looked
it up.Conan the Barbarian.Thanks W.P.Forever.Worth remembering
23 Nov 2012, 15:21 pm
@ryecatcher-388: Conan’s version is a paraphrase of the original by Genghis Khan
23 Nov 2012, 15:22 pm
“Eyewitness News Sport has learned that Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula refused to grant the South African Rugby Union (Saru) a special concession to allow Brian Mujati to play for the Springboks again.
In a written letter to Saru, Mbalula advised that the only way for Mujati to play for the Boks is if the correct process is pursued.
The Ministry said Mujati should be formerly naturalised and carry a national passport as all sportspeople representing a national team are required to do by law.” (EWN)
Hope this will be the end of it. If he does not want to become a SA citizen, that’s that.
No more calls for Mujati to be selected, please.
23 Nov 2012, 15:27 pm
@bokfan1-389: Thanks pal
23 Nov 2012, 15:32 pm
@skopdiekan-377: Hypotheses and theories (which are different) are not guesses.
Knowledge is about constantly questioning what is around you and never being satisfied with the answer. It involves physical data as well as theoretical constructs, traditions, implicit and explicit ideologies of what constitutes the world, , social practices, habitus and praxis. It also crucially includes philosophical works by Bourdieu (who did a lot of anthropology) and all the other people you are found of mentioning who were philosophers, etc.
If you ever have the time, take one of the first year philosophy and anthropology modules offered at UCT. You’d find it very enlightening, intellectually stimulating and you’ll begin to see how the dichotomy you presume to exist doesn’t amongst us Social Scientists.
23 Nov 2012, 15:33 pm
@nama1-390:
i hope “formerly” is the journalist’s version and not as spelt in the actual letter?
23 Nov 2012, 15:37 pm
@mikeybrass-392: Hi Mikey.Did you originally come on here as Michael.?Was never certain of your discipline.
Archaeology or Anthropology.?
23 Nov 2012, 15:47 pm
@mikeybrass-392: Lesson 1… Son, hypotheses are nothing more than testable guesses…
A gift to “Social Scientist” from an adherent of a more rigorous and indeed more scientific discipline… clearly
23 Nov 2012, 15:55 pm
@charo-393:
Come now Charo.It is obviously not a direct quote from the minister’s letter.
Looks like the journalist’s version of what he said afa I can gather.
23 Nov 2012, 16:09 pm
@charo-393:
I don’t know which would be more concerning.
23 Nov 2012, 16:39 pm
@gunther-397:
23 Nov 2012, 17:19 pm
@ryecatcher-394: I’ve used mikeybrass and Michael.
Archaeology (which is really a sub-discipline of Anthropology, much like cultural Anthropology is a sub-discipline).
@Heavens Game-395: Yawn. Ignorant as usual.
23 Nov 2012, 17:48 pm
@mikeybrass-399: Thanks Mikey
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