Kennedy Tsimba’s shift theory worked out far better for the All Blacks than it did the Springboks at Ellis Park on Saturday, and those shifts really mattered.
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The first Test featured the lowest ball-in-play time of any international fixture in recent times [29 minutes and 34 seconds] and the same number of total rucks between both sides [138] the men in black were averaging alone at the recent Nations Championship.
The side which built the most rucks – South Africa with 80 – lost ball to pilfer at one in every 13 rucks they set, and there were 20 handling errors and 30 turnovers of possession overall. The game was largely scrappy and unstructured as a result, and the ability to adapt successfully to the chaos of possession shifts was at a premium.
Tsimba left readers with three questions at the end of the last article, and he has now addressed them in the aftermath of Johannesburg. They were as follows:
1. How do both teams respond to contestable kicks?
2. Who adapts fastest when the original structure breaks down?
3. How does each team manage the space behind the defensive line in the shift?
*
Who won the contestable kick battle?
“The Springboks won the contestable battle,11–6 on reclaims and receipts,” Tsimba says.
“However, one of the interesting observations is winning the contest doesn’t necessarily mean winning the shift that follows.
“At 35:42 on the clock, the Springboks regain a contestable kick, but the resulting play ends with a kick directly into touch. It provides an interesting distinction between winning the initial contest and capitalising on the subsequent shift.”
Tsimba’s observation winning the contest doesn’t mean winning the shift that follows was the key to unlocking the Springboks’ performance failure. The Bokke achieved several of their pre-match goals, such as winning penalties from scrum, winning the aerial battle and puncturing the New Zealand defence with power runs by the likes of outstanding number eight Jasper Wiese.
But when it came to exploiting the contest-win, and transitioning from winning the ball to using the ball, there was a mental stop, and the Springbok mindset froze, instead of flowing and expanding with the shift. Tsimba references a clip late in the first half, after Cheslin Kolbe reclaims a high kick on the edge of the New Zealand 22.
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
If you freeze-frame as Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu receives the ball after Kolbe’s regather, there is a ‘full house’ available on attack including number six Paul de Villiers, 20 Andre Esterhuizen, 15 Damian Willemse and 12 Damian de Allende, with makeshift wing Jesse Kriel out beyond them on the left edge. New Zealand right wing Will Jordan is defending five metres inside the 15m line so this is a situation South Africa should be well able to exploit with ball in hand. Instead, the young Stormers tyro kicks the ball tamely cross-field, and straight into touch. Opportunity knocks, opportunity lost.
Who reacted and adapted first when the shift occurred and the structure fell away?
“47:22 on the clock: Fabian Holland’s kick block-down try,” Tsimba observes.
“This was a particularly good example of the behaviour I’m looking for within a shift. Holland recognised the change in the situation, reacted and executed faster than the players around him, with his charge-down ultimately producing a game-changing try.
“For me, the important part isn’t simply the charge-down. It is the recognition, reaction and adaptation under time-pressure.”
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
The Holland example is notable in comparison with a similar event at a New Zealand exit involving Eben Etzebeth at the start of the game. In the Etzebeth instance, the big man is not reacting to Ox Nche wriggling back toward his own goalline on the ground, and thereby establishing a new offside line at the ruck. He does not adjust to the shift and is penalised, whereas Holland not only blocks down the kick by Grant Williams, he reacts outstandingly to the loose ball created.
How did each team manage the backfield in the defensive shift?
“There were two contrasting examples,” Tsimba notes.
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
“At 65:18, Williams receives an outlet pass from a kick-shift and makes a line-break. The All Blacks’ backfield responds by looking to force a ruck which allows for a contest at the breakdown. This is called ‘danger to dominance’. Jordan recognises the opportunity and wins the race to the contest, resulting in a holding shift penalty against the Springboks.
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
“At 68:36, after a ruck shift, quick passing finds Jordie Barrett who identifies kick space while the Springbok backfield is still scrambling to close it. That then creates an isolation and breakdown contest, eventually leading to a 22 entry, two yellow cards [the first on 21 Marco van Staden at the end of the clip] and a try in that shift sequence.
“So, there is a big contrast in how the two teams managed the defensive backfield once the original structure had been disrupted.”
Tsimba goes on to state how winning small moments in the shift can create a chain reaction further down the line.
“At 55:43, there is an excellent example of what I’m starting to think of as a shift sequence, where one shift creates the next,” he says.
“It starts with a shift penalty to the All Blacks at a crucial five-metre scrum, reversing the penalty trend up until that point. That leads to an exit and then a contestable kick from the Boks. Jordan wins the contest and adapts quickly to evade the defensive pressure, which creates a line-break for Damian McKenzie.
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
“That eventually leads to a scrum five metres out and Luke Jacobson’s try.
“So the entire sequence looks like this:
All Blacks scrum shift ?
All Blacks exit ?
Springbok contestable kick ?
Contest won by All Blacks ?
Adaptation by All Blacks ?
Line-break by All Blacks?
All Blacks 5m scrum ?
All Blacks try
“Sometimes a shift isn’t one isolated moment. It can become a chain reaction where one advantage creates the next, and a rolling wave of momentum in the unstructured moments of the game.”
Tsimba also makes one other pertinent comment on a scenario which arose towards the end of the first half, and how it might be treated differently in law.
“At 37:04 on the clock, the Springboks turn the ball over again at the ruck, creating a shift the All Blacks are beginning to exploit. However, the referee stops play because two All Blacks were lying injured on the other side of the field. It was a head clash which led to Ethan de Groot and Josh Lord being replaced for good.
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 24, 2026
“The question that occurred to me concerned the nature of the restart in this situation.
“If the ball was effectively in the attacking team’s possession and the attacking team was beginning exploit the shift, why should the restart necessarily become a contest again if the ball was already being used effectively in transition?
“The referee’s decision to stop play was clearly the right one, as there are obvious protocols governing these situations. It’s more of a genuine shift/game-design question:
“When an external stoppage interrupts a shift, should the restart rehearse a contest which has already been won? Is there another way in which it can recreate the dynamic change in game state?”
These clips illustrate how the All Blacks reacted to fluid shifts in the game more quickly and more decisively than the Springboks. Even though South Africa won the aerial battle ‘set-piece’, they did not make as much use of the changes in possession they had engineered.
“The interesting story here is although South Africa won the contestable kick battle, the Test provided some fascinating examples of how the quality of the response after the initial shift can be just as important as winning the initial contest,” Tsimba says.
Rassie Erasmus has one week to fix the Springboks’ mindset and their technical accuracy before the second Test in Cape Town.
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As Kennedy Tsimba would greet you at this time of day, mangwanane ,Nick , marara sei ?(Good morning, how did you sleep) A greeting I used every morning during the years we lived in Zimbabwe.
Late here, just skimmed the article…excellent as always…will read it properly in the morn !
Great article Nick - I would love to be your news editor - forever the angle.
I am much more comfortable now about the Springboks ability to turn this round having read your article.
To go back to your boxing analogy. Ringrust. Beaten to the punch every time.
It’s an execution problem vs a systemic problem. The execution will improve - it could hardly get worse - and it just won’t be that bad again. The systemic problem is far more difficult to fix. The AB’s might be a bit better in contact but not that much simply because they are outmuscled.
As you have pointed out numerous times the AB’s are deadly on the attach when they achieve their stated intention of long ball in play time and multiple quick rucks. You said that if they achieve that they will beat South Africa and if they don’t they won’t - paraphrasing but generally that was the import of tactical discussion leading up to the game.
They created attacking opportunity through Bok inefficiency not through creative unstoppable build up as is their method of creating tries.
So as you so irrefutably point out in the article the Boks were their own worst enemies -and one mistake was compounded by another plus the tactical blunger of not bringing Reinach on immediately and shifting Williams to wing.
So two questions.
Can the AB’s expect to have high ball in play time and multiple quick rucks on Saturday?
If the answer is yes - as before the first test - they win series over.
If the answer is no, how do they structure their attack assuming the Boks D is back to its best or at least something near it?
Let’s see.
Exactly, and it was a game SA should have won with the number of 22 entries they manufactured. What we didn’t factor in was how much more switched-on the ABs would be in these transtional scenarios. That counted for even more and shows how much work is being inputted by the new coaching staff.
When you go in with the attitude of ‘we are going to overwhelm you with our physical dominance’ - as the Boks unquestionably did - you often lose effectivenes in these transitional areas, and that is what happened. It’s no longer your focus.
That is exactly what ‘Tony-ball’ achieved at the Cake Tin - more awareness of these situations and how important they are - and that is why I say the Boks have regressed from that game.
The AB swould love to beat the Boks by their preferred method of building momentum by the ruck. But if not, the first Test showed tthere is another way for them to win.
This is where I believe Dave Rennie and his coaching staff has been vital to NZ. They are not playing the numbers anymore but playing whats in front of them. In every situation players are responding to vital information, how many players are in the line, who are the players in the line (prop, winger, flanker etc), where is the space? Overlap? Who is in support? Where are the runners? Coming at pace or not? what follows is entirely dependent on the picture in front of them, long kick to exploit space behind, run at a weak or slow defender, spread the ball out wide, play to support, take contact or offload. The decision is designed to break the game open. Thats why NZ are thriving in the shift again and scoring off turnovers.
The Springboks did not do that in the first test and its been lacking in the last 3 tests to be honest. Once the shift happens their use of the ball is ponderous, what do we do next? kind of response. The kick out wide from Sacha was a frazzled response. Whenever they turned over the ball or found space in wide areas they were turned over in that phase or the subsequent one. In the 22 they relied on just the heavies to do the work and their one try was a bust from a power player, hardly any deftness there. When they move the ball out wide it sometimes seems like its just to get it there to see whats on, then they go back to the heavies. They didnt really engineer their opportunities, they won them through power and when you depend on power alone your game fades as your power fades as it did in the second half. The Boks have game breaking backs but they barely used them, they have outstanding creative players but they simply used their muscle and became obsessed with the scrum in the game breaking moment in the third quarter. The Boks are generating enough shifts to win the game but as NZ proved its how you shift and not the shift itself that wins it.
The win and winning margin last game was impressive but most of all, they turned the tide. That’s a huge reflection on his coaching. Beyond having the sense to finally start Roigard/Love as the 9/10 axis and giving Ardie the captains band, the squad isn’t a total clear-out from the last regime. He is clearly getting more out of these players.
I think there is a real clarity to what he asks of his players and they seem to be empowered to go out and react and fix things themselves.
Even when they called for scums late on, it wasn’t the water boy or physio running on with instructions to tell them to do it. Just 40 minutes earlier they weren’t even surviving in the scrums.
Maybe it does come back to haunt them, but they don’t kick penalties. There is never a huddle of 3 players on a penalty call deciding if it goes to the corner, scrum, kick - whatever. Total efficiency.
They are no longer relying on fast starts and commanding leads to win games either. Despite Rennie being a recent appointment, they are probably now exactly where you’d want them to be 3 years into a world cup cycle.
This is the nub of it NLR. Someof he decision-making around choice of play at set-piece may improve with Pollard at 10, but he won’t improve the decision-making in these vital transitional areas. That’s why I would have preferred to see Libbok at 10, to bring Damian Willemse inot the game on attack.