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What Tony Johnson is hearing about the vacant All Blacks assistant role
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Jake White: The Springbok scrum can be conquered, and this is how
By Jake White
When looking back at last weekend’s feast of rugby, you can’t get past the game in Dublin. By my reckoning, it took over two hours. It was frustrating, slightly crazy but an utterly compelling watch. During the game, I watched with interest as pundits kept praising the referee for the way he was managing the game – most notably the scrum. Indeed, Matt Carley’s bravery in giving a succession of yellow cards against the home team’s pack, which was buckling under Springbok pressure, was lauded. Many post-match comments from the Irish fans were through green-tinted glasses, saying with a hint of sarcasm that the referee was man of the match. No surprises there.
However, Bernard Jackman, the former Irish hooker, said on comms that you couldn’t blame the Boks for playing in the style they did because it was well within the laws of the game. With what unfolded, Andy Farrell’s bench calls didn’t look too clever. Ireland picked James Ryan and Tadhg Beirne to start, but once Ryan was red carded, they had to move the lightweight Ryan Baird up to lock and call on Cian Prendergast, a No. 8, onto the field. By not having a ready-made 120-125kg lock on the bench, they were underpowered. As Andrew Porter and Paddy McCarthy left the field for yellow cards, they were woefully exposed at scrum time. How they missed ‘big’ Joe McCarthy.
You can be assured that the bench splits will be a key talking point ahead of World Cup selection. Do you go with a 5-3, 6-2 or 7-1 split? It can either work for you, or blow up in your face, as happened with Ireland.
If you look at the current shape of the game, it made me think that if the World Cup was coming in two week’s time, South Africa would be head and shoulders above any team at scrum time. Indeed, lawmakers are unlikely to change anything between now and the 2027 World Cup, so the rest of the world is playing catch-up.
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That’s where I get to the next point. What about the chasing pack? What do they need to do? Well, for some, change may be necessary. Here in SA, in 2017 Allister Coetzee got fired two years before Rassie won his first World Cup in 2019. Ian McIntosh got fired two years before Kitch Christie won the 1995 World Cup. Now I’m not saying there should be wholesale changes for the challengers at the top, but what I am saying is that now we’ve passed the midpoint of the World Cup cycle, they have to find a way to refocus, to find new thinking, introduce new voices, new ideas and energy.
I worked in 1995 with Kitch and what he focused on was bringing in a fitness element. He wanted the Boks to be fitter than any team at the World Cup. In 2018, Rassie introduced overseas players – which hadn’t been available to Allister when he was coach, and that worked. My point is a ‘big idea’ is needed to bridge the widening gap.
Teams like New Zealand, France, England, Argentina, maybe Ireland, who are there or thereabouts, need to work out what they need to win the Webb Ellis Cup. If you look at their current trajectory, none of them look like they’re going to win the World Cup, as it stands.
One thing I’d start with is finding props who can withstand Bok pressure. It was interesting to hear what David Flatman, the former England prop, said during the Argentina game. He said England were being supremely aggressive at scrum-time, even when it threatened penalties against them. He mused that if the England front-row were going to have any chance of coping with the South African front-row, they have to be able to go on the front foot and go at an opposition front row hard. It was an excellent point. Fortune favours the brave. They have their ‘Pom squad’, with Joe Heyes and Fin Baxter, and Ellis Genge and Will Stuart, and it’s bearing fruit. I want to give a shout-out to Stevie Scott, the Bath scrum-coach. He’s had a direct impact on Thomas du Toit, Stuart and even the Welsh tighthead Archie Griffin. They’ve all become more destructive scrummagers under his tutelage. He’s doing for props what Lee Blackett has done for England’s backline!
Maybe coaches will look to the past. In the old days, I remember they started transforming prop-like hookers, like Federico Mendez to play at hooker. John Smit did the job with us of playing in both positions. Jan Hendrik Wessels can double up in both positions and if you look at Malcolm Marx, he’s built like Bismarck du Plessis, men big enough to play prop. That could have an influence on selection for Australia if countries have those sorts of heavy boned athletes at their disposal.
The problem for a lot of countries is unearthing some 145kg props, who can scrummage, move around the field and have soft handling skills, but that’s the type of outside-the-box thinking that is required to counteract what is a natural strength of the Boks.
My final point on this is that while you have to get your accuracy right at the lineout, compete and throw it straight, one thing that hasn’t been addressed is putting the ball under the hooker’s foot. Now I know people will say that’s being pedantic, but if you don’t need to be skilled as a hooker at scrum-time, you may as well pick another prop there. Why not, if you’re not penalised?
Games don’t all go that way, of course. In the Wales versus New Zealand game, it was 26 minutes until the first scrum, so you can get away with an inferior pack, to a point, but it’s a risk.
That bench split brings me onto the ‘hybrid player’ and raises a smile. I mean, it’s nothing new. Sticking a guy at flanker for 5 or 10 minutes doesn’t suddenly make him an expert in both positions. In the amateur days, guys would double up if they ran out of players with concussions or injuries. It’s a gimmick or soundbite for the modern audience. Ruan Pienaar would play at 9 and then on the wing, Joost (van der Westhuizen) did the same. Stephen Larkham played as a replacement 9 and ended up winning the World Cup as a fly-half. I don’t think anyone is reinventing the wheel. As a squad playing a contact sport, you just have to be versatile in 80 minutes because the unexpected often happens.
Finally, let’s look at the last Test of the Autumn Series. I see Rassie is only picking from 24 or 25 players. I remember before he got the job, that was the norm and coaches were expected to make do on smaller squads. I feel sorry for Wales, with 13 players going back to England and France but where does that leave us? I’ll say this, Test rugby is very important. It is the pinnacle of our game. Call me a traditionalist, but a Test where your best players aren’t available, or it’s played outside the designated window is not the way it should be done. Sure, it’s economically driven and needs must, but we must be careful we are not watering down Test matches. If Wales get drilled on Saturday and that goes down in the history books, it’s not a great look. These are two proud rugby nations, who, remember, duked it out in the 2019 World Cup semi-final. The window is there for a reason. I know they’ve said the fixture was planned with the old regime, but proper planning needs to be in place. Now I’m not for one second saying ‘overseas’ players should be picked – I’m not changing my view on that, but if you play outside the window, you have to deal with the consequences.
There’s a lot of Test rugby being played these days. The Wallabies looked exhausted and Rassie has needed a bloated squad just to get through 15 Tests in five months. Our Test scene has so many great values, but it’s called a test for a reason – you’re playing against the best of the best. The day it feels like you’re going through the motions, or it’s just a day job, will be a sad day for the game. I’m sure they get a decent crowd in Wales because they love their rugby, but you don’t want overkill. If it were a full strength both sides, it would be a sell-out.
As ever, I’d love to know your thoughts.
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