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Erasmus fires back at 'quirky quotes' Vunipola after Kolbe lift
Springboks director Rassie Erasmus has targeted Mako Vunipola in his incendiary hour-long assessment of last weekend’s first Test win by the Lions, issuing a stinging rebuke to the loosehead for his quirky description of his decision to lift Cheslin Kolbe up off the ground at a time when it appeared the South African winger had been injured.
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Erasmus initially took to Twitter early on Monday morning to complain about the Vunipola intervention, claiming: “Cheslin is obviously played in the air and clearly not direct into touch!! More importantly for youngsters watching this clip!!!! Please never move or touch an injured player on the ground, it’s reckless and dangerous! Leave this to the @WorldRugby @Springboks @lionsofficial.”
Vunipola was quickly given his chance to give his reply, appearing at a Lions media session later on Monday where he stated in response to Erasmus: “I guess if he was really hurt then it was a bit reckless, but I just felt like the collision wasn’t that bad. I saw that people were putting it up (on social media) and mentioning it. We were behind at the time and I wanted to get some tempo in the game so I wanted to get the ball off him.
“If I did hurt him then I do apologise but in the heat of the moment, you just react as you would naturally. He seemed to be alright, he played on in the game, so it wasn’t that reckless, was it?”
Erasmus revisited the incident in his dramatic 26-clip, hour-long first Test video review which he filmed on Tuesday and seeped into the public domain on Thursday. The Springboks boss insisted the Vunipola intervention was the third wrong thing to happen as he was adamant that Kolbe was tackled in the air by Ali Price and that he also landed with his foot in play and not in touch as ruled by the officials.
Cheslin is obviously played in the air and clearly not direct into touch!!More importantly for youngsters watching this clip!!!! Please never move or touch an injured player on the ground, its reckless and dangerous! Leave this to the ? ??@WorldRugby @Springboks @lionsofficial pic.twitter.com/lEcp5L4PBf
— Rassie Erasmus (@RassieRugby) July 26, 2021
Speaking in his scathing review of the 22-17 loss by the Springboks, Erasmus said: “People laugh at this one but even at primary school level in South Africa we get told when a player lies on the ground you leave him lying like that until the medics come up. We have a programme called BokSmart which we follow strictly where we know when a player is down on the ground you don’t touch him. You actually leave him in that position.
“Now for me, it’s actually incredible that three things in a row happened here. The first thing is without a doubt, I can show you three angles where Cheslin Kolbe was played in the air. There was no penalty or referral for him being played in the air, that is the first part.
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“Then in the second part, he actually landed infield and then he was taken out. And then the third thing, Vunipola comes and just pulls him up from the ground as if it’s just a doll which he picks up. If that was a serious neck injury or back injury I don’t think he would have laughed and had these quirky quotes which he currently has in the newspaper and which is all over social media. This shows a total lack of respect for the Springboks team.
“Is it okay if any of the Lions players are injured Saturday and are lying on their back, will we just go and pull them up, say get up, you’re not injured? Is that the level of respect that is shown towards the Springboks if we show the same level of respect towards the Lions on Saturday? So three mistakes were made in this area. Played in the air, wasn’t out on the full… (and then Vunipola’s intervention).”
Erasmus went on to contrast the way Kolbe was manhandled with what happened to Faf de Klerk in the 68th minute when he tried to get his hands on a ball that was out of play for a Springboks lineout only to be held by Ken Owens and Maro Itoje.
“It’s comical the respect the ARs [the assistant referees] and the other guys showed towards the South African players compared to the Lions players but I guess we saw that coming and we tried to tell the referees that but unfortunately it didn’t look like that worked.”
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Has Rassie just hoodwinked the rugby world?#CastleLionsSeries #LionsRugby #RSAvBIL https://t.co/8n9DoiJvCJ
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) July 29, 2021
Comments on RugbyPass
Who's Jarrad Hohepa?
1 Go to commentsSo let me get this straight. Say you have the dominant scrum. You are 99% sure you can go for a scrum pushover try on the line to win the game. The opposition knows it too. They give away a silly tap kick instead. You are now not allowed to scrum. This is ridiculous! *%@ing the game up as usual! The fact that the attacking teams are not allowed to scrum from a held up over the line is just as ridiculous. Really world rugby? Careful people might start a rebel league called True Rugby or Real Rugby.
72 Go to comments12 subs during a game? How has that been allowed to happen NB? I hate when the game goes in this monopolistic direction closing up shop, it just becomes non sport. Btw have you seen anything of how Liam Coltman was tracking for Lyon? He has just signed to return to Otago though we have a couple of young hookers developing here. He was a popular gentle natured character down here and I’m glad to see him back but maybe he will be a mentor primarily?
4 Go to commentsGreat breakdown and the global politics always confuses me a little. The southern hemisphere seems to be left out a bit but I wouldn’t even know where to start with fixing it. Club challenge could be a step in the right direction
4 Go to commentsSince he coached Free state, from that time onwards, I maintained he was the coach for the Boks. A nice, no nonsense guy with an excellent brain, who gets results.
11 Go to commentswell - they only played against 14 men and had the TMO team on their side - and still should have lost… so actually that makes sense.
32 Go to commentsSouthern hemisphere Rugby is exactly that, boring. Northern Hemisphere Rugby is soooo much more entertaining and better with better players.
2 Go to commentsIf he was to be cited for a dangerous behavior, then it’s natural that he should be. Then NTamack too, yes? And I’ll add a good whataboutism - Yeandle eye-gouging on Richie Arnold: not cited. Eye-gouging. Not high tackle. Eye-gouging. It was on French TV, with French TV directors.
5 Go to commentsReally poorly written rambling piece ..
4 Go to commentsIt was so boring
2 Go to commentspersonally I’d go with : 1. France 2. NZ 3. England 4. Ireland 5. Scotland
32 Go to commentsAndy everything becomes easier with experience therefor counting etc straight after a match becomes easier when you have 100+ caps vs 17 which is the experience you speak from.
160 Go to commentsGetting rid of the Dupont Law is a good thing and ought to have been done months ago! Officially getting rid of the croc roll is a good thing. The law about no scrums from a short arm is well intended in terms of speeding the game up but it’s an overreaction to a clever yet calculated gamble that could have blow up in South Africa’s face if they conceded a penalty from the scrum that was set after Willemse took claimed the mark in the World Cup QF.
72 Go to commentsRassie The GOAT
11 Go to commentsOf their 5 big matches in RWC Scotland and NZ were the easiest. They took a 12-3 lead against NZ and after the red decided it was best to hold the lead and take chances that came. None came and it was tight but they dug a lot deeper in the other two knock out matches. They had trounced NZ in Twickenham in a fixture that NZ must now regret. Psychology was clearly with SA in the final as a result.
32 Go to commentsMy favourite line/exchanges from Chasing the Sun 2. News headline: “SA. The last hurdle in ABs World Cup glory”. Something like that. “You’re all just a hurdle. A hop, skip and a jump”. Coming from Rassie and Jacque. Basically - nobody thinks you’re going to win. You’re just a pushover team. Nobody respects you. When the camera shows the players faces, you can see the effect. You can see the rev meters (die moer metertjies) firing up. Mitchell said he felt it prior to the 19 final. He said to Eddie watching the teams warming up that it was going to be a tough day at the office. Wave a red flag in front of South African, and you can expect a reaction. This is not unique - many teams rev themselves. And Bok teams in particular. With horrific consequences (discipline, poor thinking under pressure) because that’s the drawback to using emotion right? But what this Bok team does better than many since 2007 is channel the emotion and stay on task. Despite the emotion. Why, because while Rassie might play mind games - he talks about creating a safe environment. Listen to his recent honorary doctorate acceptance speech. While he uses psychology he creates psychological safety. He’s a damn fine coach. Can’t wait for Pretoria. It’s going to be a hummer.
11 Go to commentsWhat Rassie does for SA is big. It has helped people to unite and see we can win with the right people in place.
11 Go to commentsTerrible conditions for young players to express themselves just enjoy it guys. As a saffa great to see Ausie youth looking good. Wow SA have some great talent also.
2 Go to commentsYes, another example of French tv directors ensuring that incidents like this are swiftly glossed over for the benefit of their teams…
5 Go to commentsThe prospect of the club match ups across hemispheres is surely appetising for everyone. The reality however, may prove to be slightly different. There are currently two significant driving forces that have delivered to same teams consistently to the latter champions cup stages for years now. The first of those is the yawning gap in finances, albeit delivered by different routes. In France it’s wealthy private owners operating with a higher salary cap by some distance compared to England. In Ireland it’s led by a combination of state tax relief support, private Leinster academy funding and IRFU control - the provincial budgets are not equal! This picture is not going to change anytime soon. The second factor is the EPCR competition rules. You don’t need a PhD. in advanced statistical analysis from oxbridge to see the massive advantage bestowed upon the home team through every ko round of the tournament. The SA teams will gain the opportunity for home ko ties in due course but that could actually polarise the issue even further, just look at their difficulties playing these ties in Europe and then reverse them for the opposition travelling to SA. Other than that, the picture here is unlikely to change either, with heavyweight vested interests controlling the agenda. So what does all this point to for the club world championship? Well the financial differential between the nh and sh teams is pretty clear. And the travel issues and sporting challenge for away teams are significantly exacerbated beyond those already seen in the EPCR tournaments. So while the prospect of those match ups may whet our rugby appetites, I’m very much still to be convinced the reality will live up to expectations…
4 Go to comments