The pearl-clutching over Rassie Erasmus is truly ridiculous this time

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On Monday, at a four-star hotel in northern Johannesburg, Rassie Erasmus called out the names of 23 players. At this point, that’s the most accurate we can be about Springboks team announcements. There are still more than 96 hours before kick-off in the third Test of the series against New Zealand and anything could change.

Maybe the injured Damian Willemse, not among the listed players, will actually get a run on. Maybe Duane Vermeulen will discard his coach’s whistle and lace up his boots once more. Maybe Cheslin Kolbe will slot in at loosehead with Thomas du Toit patrolling the backfield. In the bizarro world that Erasmus has fostered over eight fruitful years, anything is possible.

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Detractors will never be convinced that the Springboks coach, despite the success and groaning trophy cabinet, is anything other than a bully and a conman. Someone who is never satisfied unless he’s pushing someone else’s buttons. Who could start a fight in an empty room, who tramples over the spirit of rugby with muddy boots whenever he can.

Last week, he gave them plenty of ammunition. Handre Pollard was named at fly-half, then replaced by Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu after suffering a calf injury. Siya Kolisi was cleared to return and displaced Paul de Villiers. Kolbe recovered from a knock and came in for Kurt-Lee Arendse. Then, an hour before kick-off in Cape Town, Erasmus changed the entire front row.

It was either a brilliant tactical adjustment in response to a shift in the weather, a magnificently elaborate piece of misdirection, or both. The match went ahead and the Springboks won. Nobody was harmed, except perhaps the sacred convention that a team announced several days before kick-off is a team that has actually been selected. Cue the pearl clutching, most notably from British journalists who find themselves peering in from beyond the velvet rope.

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The real trick Erasmus pulled off was stripping away the veneer of a ritual that really has no value. For reasons no one can properly explain, rugby expects its teams to be announced days before the match. This is codified in the regulations at World Cups where a 48-hour window is treated as some binding pledge. Thou shalt not change thy line-up unless a player is beset by injury.

The question is, why? Why should a coach be bound to a decision he makes days in advance of kick-off? Why shouldn’t he be able to change his mind? Why should he have to telegraph his game plan to the opposition? Who is this for?

It is not really for the players, who already know whether they are starting. It is not for the supporters, who will attend the match regardless. It is not even especially useful for the coaches, who would surely prefer to preserve some uncertainty about their plans.

It is for the machinery of rugby: the press conferences, the preview shows, the content calendars and the endless cycle of analysis that needs to be filled before the ball is kicked. Editors can build their week around it. Journalists can rest easy knowing at least one article has been teed up for them. The podcasters receive some oven-ready content.

But wouldn’t the machine thrum with even more energy if some things were left to speculation? Cricket and football have worked out that the team sheet can wait. Their line-ups are announced shortly before play begins, when the match is about to become real. Nobody feels cheated. Nobody complains that the spectacle has been diminished by not knowing the XI four days earlier.

In fact, the opposite is true. The intrigue is better when it is genuine. Imagine walking towards FNB Stadium in Soweto on Saturday, the dusk-coloured calabash looming large over gold-brown fields. The smell of braai smoke sitting heavy in the cold Highveld air. A sea of people in bottle green jerseys and every one of them spouting different theories on who they’ll see.

“I’d pick Fassi if I were Rassie.” “No way, start Sacha at 15 and let Manie run the show from 10”. “I read somewhere that Cheslin could actually play at fullback.”

Cut to Jean de Villiers pitch-side and even he can’t be sure. “Kolbe is fielding a lot of high balls in the warm-up,” he’ll tell the SuperSport studio host. “But who knows what Rassie is cooking up.”

The practical objection is that this would make preparation more difficult. Good. Coaches are paid to solve problems, not eliminate every possible source of them. Players are supposed to adapt. Rugby prides itself on being a game of decisions made under pressure, yet its biggest decision is made four days before the pressure begins.

Erasmus has shown that the convention is not sacred. In a way, he’s shown that very little is sacred to him beyond his country, his team and the dynasty he has forged from near ruin. But Erasmus is more than a provocateur, bully or conman. He is a Baptist preacher, a man who has made himself indispensable to the South African cause. He doesn’t merely ask for trust. He asks for belief. His players are the congregation, his critics the heathens and every trophy a confirmation that the sermon was right. He throws himself before the bullets, fights for his players and carries the burden of a nation that believes it is forever misunderstood. Every controversy strengthens the myth. Every trophy confirms the faith.

He is not simply selecting a team. He is delivering a sermon that he alone has the authority to edit.

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