Kicked into touch
by David Campese | 01 December 2009 (09:58)
So where’s South Africa’s kicking game now? Two Test defeats, two losses to club sides and a win over Italy doesn’t say much for how effective the Springboks’ game plan is does it?
This tour has been a real eye-opener for South Africa and hopefully you’ll now agree with me that the problem is that the Springboks are just too one-dimensional.
Whenever I have questioned how dull the Springboks’ approach is the bloggers have waded in with their abusive comments without even taken a second to think about what I was saying.
Yet kicking is a problem. There is simply too much of it and I notice other columnists have also started to push the debate about it.
The Springboks reached a real low point against the Irish. Their only thought was to kick the shit out of the ball – get it and kick it, anywhere.
I suppose that’s to be expected with 9, 10 and 12 from the Bulls, 15 too!, but how come no-one said, “guys this is not working let’s try something else.”
The trouble for the Boks is that they have added no refinements to the way they play. They just kick it as far as possible with absolutely no variation.
Surely if you want to play a kicking game you have to play the best kicking game possible? Where were the grubbers, the taps over the top, the diagonal kicks for someone to run onto and even the long touch-finder to gain some breathing space?
I have never said don’t kick the ball at all. It obviously has its place, but the Springboks have got to the point where to kick the ball is all they’ve got!
And I’m afraid I have to say it – Morné Steyn is not an international class flyhalf. Sure he’s a helluva goal-kicker, although he was not that effective in soft, cold conditions, but he brings nothing different to the position. He asks no questions of the opposition, tends to telegraph what he’s going to do and, as I’ve said, his first instinct is to hoof it.
And the same goes for Wynand Olivier. He’s just so predictable. Puts his ears back and has a go and Zane Kirchner also does not look like someone who might add another dimension. Ruan Pienaar, who’s meant to be South Africa’s running flyhalf, came on and instead of changing things just carried on putting boot to the ball.
You have to ask what Peter de Villiers thinks he’s doing? There’s clearly not been much coaching going on because the Boks have stagnated and it doesn’t say much for his resolve or ability as a selector that at the first sign of crisis he gave up his plan to have John Smit play tighthead.
If I’m not mistaken Smit was at 3 when South Africa beat the Lions and took the Tri-Nations so the coaches could not have been that committed to the plan if they could give it up so easily.
It also does not do much for the confidence of players to be taken on tour only to be overtaken for a Test cap by others who were not in the original squad.
There’s no doubt the cracks are showing in the Springbok façade and I can’t help but remind you of my column some two months ago in which I speculated that New Zealand 2011 might be a bridge too far for this team – to outraged reaction from South African fans. Wonder what they say now?
The weekend’s other Tests proved one of the oldest rules of this game – never take your opposition for granted.
I felt both the Welsh and the French thought they would come away with victories over the Wallabies and the All Blacks respectively and got rattled when it didn’t go their way.
Going on the first few scrums it looked as though the All Blacks were going to get flogged but they came back to put up probably the best Test performance of the year. The Blacks just have a way of delivering players who can stand up to be counted and this tour has yet again shown that you can never count them out. They also seem to have finally settled on how they want to play.
It’s been interesting to see how many commentators - coaches, former players, writers – are starting to question the appalling amount of kicking that’s been a blight on international matches.
The problem is that it’s just so easy to kill the ball, so I’ll say it again, let’s bring back rucking – it’s the only way to make the ball faster so we can get back to scoring tries rather than just kicking the ball.
