Springboks concede famous bench tactic finally 'backfired' against All Blacks

Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus has conceded that his famous 6/2 bench tactic “backfired” on his team against the All Blacks at Ellis Park, and it was an avoidable mistake.

South Africa, famous for their physical forward pack, opted to double down on that strength for game one of the Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry Test series, stacking their bench with six forwards and just two backs as opposed to the traditional five forwards and three backs, which provides more even cover in the event of injury.

While hybrid midfielder-cum-loose forward Andre Esterhuizen provided a safety net with his versatility, Erasmus revealed that the original plan for the 193 cm, 113 kg Sharks bruiser was to deploy him as a flanker in the match.

A 21-3 second-half scoreline was the difference in the match after a too-tight-to-call first half, highlighting the teams’ respective reserve units. Not helping Erasmus’ plans for the match was a ninth-minute injury-forced substitution, which disrupted his desired impact from the bench later in the contest.

While the coach wouldn’t lay any blame at the feet of his bench for their impact, despite them accounting for two yellow cards as the game slipped away from the hosts in the second half, he did recognise the final quarter of the match as an issue that needed addressing.

Following the match, Erasmus denied the suggestion that the loss was a “catastrophe”, saying the Boks have been down before and have always found a way to fight back. That perspective was maintained at Monday’s team announcement, though it included additional context this time around.

“Obviously, it’s concerning. When I say it’s not a catastrophe, it’s awful. It’s shit. It’s not nice to be in this position. I would rather play bad and win than play good and lose. I thought for quite a number of minutes, we played well, but we lost. That’s frustrating,” the coach summarised.

“I don’t want to make excuses because what happened was on me and on us as a team. But I think for the first time in a long time, the 6/2 (bench) experiment backfired on us. I’ll say it as it is. But I think, odds-wise, if you take how many times we’ve done it, I think this is the first one.

“When Kurt-Lee (Arendse) got injured, Jesse (Kriel) went to the wing, Damian (Williemse) went to outside centre; we would’ve liked to play Andre as an impact flanker, he had to go to 12, then the whole backline was rejigged with that one injury to Kurt-Lee. That was bad planning by myself.

“Probably a better thing would have been to put Gaza (Willemse) on the wing, put Sacha (Feinberg-Mngomezulu) at fullback and put Manie (Libbok) at 10. Then the 12/13 stays intact. We also had Grant (Williams) that could have gone to wing and Cobus (Reinach) could have come straight on. I think I made the incorrect sub there and that disjointed the whole attack flow, and obviously some of the defensive stuff.”