In the Shona language native to Zimbabwe there is a well-known phrase: ‘tsimba itsoka’. It means ‘no foot, no footprint’ and it refers firstly to the footprint an animal may leave on the veld; on the larger scale of human activity, it highlights to the deep mark a man or a woman may leave on the ground of life.
NEW: Follow Your favourites in the App 📱
You can now follow their favourite teams, tournaments and players in the RugbyPass App!
A few weeks ago, I met Kennedy Tsimba, the current Skills coach of the Pretoria-based Bulls. As a player, Kennedy was a star in Sevens and he was anointed the ‘King of Bloemfontein’ for his record-breaking try-scoring feats with the Cheetahs. Tsimba became the fastest player to score over 1000 points in the Currie Cup, the Vodacom Cup and Super Rugby during his six-year stint in the Vrystaat and he is remembered. The footprint is strong.
In his second lifetime as a skills coach, Tsimba is looking to transform the understanding of what rugby can be in the professional era. He reminds me of Sir Wayne Smith, helping create a new climate for attacking rugby in the Republic. He is digging the same irrigation ditches, and siting the same sprinklers in South Africa as ‘the Professor’ did in New Zealand.
During his time as peak coaching influencer in the Henry-Hansen epoch with the All Blacks, Smithy borrowed from the Los Angeles Lakers’ legendary ‘fast-break offence’ in the 1980s and traded basketball coin for rugby gold. The Lakers created turnovers with strong defence and used high-intensity transition sprints to spread the court and create two-on-ones on the counter. Super-slick passing and the swift identification of mismatches were the key to success.
In the great All Blacks teams of the 2010s, Smithy wanted 14 men on their feet in defence, generating lightning-quick turnovers with the ball passed through second receiver automatically, and everyone working at maximum capacity for the first three phases of the transition from defence to attack. As he observed during an excellent Rugby Site mentoring session:
“When I was young and playing the game at youth level, I was taught you always base your attack on what the defence is doing. Your kick counterattack should be based on what the opposition chase is doing.
“I want to try and grow the understanding of how to counter-attack off kick-receipts, what to look for, and how best to exploit a chasing line. You get stable as soon as you can as an attacking team, and attack them while they are still unstable, or unstructured as a defence.
“It’s the best chance of success. There is a great attacking platform [to be had] off turnover and kick receipts. Counterattacks dominate the scoring in the modern game, and it’s a part of the game that needs to be coached.”
Now ex-Otago first five-eighth Tony Brown and Kennedy Tsimba are spreading the same gospel in South Africa, in a culture which has traditionally emphasized the power of defence, kicking and set-piece. Both the Springboks, and the teams below them in the URC, are becoming more and more ‘comfortable in chaos’. Kennedy sent me the following transcript, summarizing the impacts of what he terms ‘Shift Theory’:
Why Transition Matters. The Coaching Conversation Rugby Needs to Have
Every coach knows the feeling.
You spend a week preparing for the perfect lineout launch. The attack shape is clear. The defensive system has been rehearsed. Every player understands their role.
Then, three minutes into the match, the ball ricochets off a contest, two players slip, someone instinctively chips ahead, and suddenly everything you rehearsed has disappeared.
The game has asked a different question.
For years, rugby coaching has become exceptionally good at preparing players for certainty. We have built sophisticated attacking systems, defensive frameworks and set-piece detail that continue to raise the standard of the game.
Yet rugby has never been played entirely on the coach’s white-board. It has always belonged to the moments when the picture changes.
Imagine teaching someone to sail.
You can spend hours explaining how to steer, trim the sails and navigate calm water. But no sailor is ultimately judged by how they perform in perfect conditions. They are judged by what they do when the wind suddenly changes direction.
Modern rugby feels remarkably similar.
The teams that consistently succeed are not simply those with the best systems. They are often the teams that recognise change first and adapt before anyone else.
That observation has shaped much of my coaching journey.
Rather than asking, “How do we become better organised?” I found myself asking a different question:
What happens when organisation disappears? That single question led me into years of studying elite rugby through the lens of adaptability. It led me to examine the Springboks’ ability to thrive under pressure, to explore why certain international teams appear so comfortable in broken play, and even to look beyond rugby into football, where transitions have long been recognised as moments that define matches.
The more I observed, the more one idea kept returning. Perhaps we have misunderstood where modern rugby is really played. Not inside structure. But in the moments between structures.
Those moments are rarely neat. They cannot be fully scripted. They arrive disguised as turnovers, kick returns, loose balls, unexpected offloads and defensive collisions. They last only seconds, yet they often determine momentum, field position and, ultimately, the outcome of games.
The challenge for coaches is no longer simply to build better systems. It is to prepare players for the instant those systems dissolve.
This is not an argument against structure. Far from it. Structure remains the platform from which teams launch their ambitions. But perhaps our coaching conversations have become unbalanced.
We devote extraordinary energy to teaching players what to do when the picture remains stable. Should we now spend equal energy preparing them for when it changes?
As rugby accelerates towards Rugby World Cup 2027, the margins between the world’s leading teams continue to narrow. Physical preparation is exceptional. Tactical detail is extraordinary. Skill levels continue to rise.
The next competitive advantage may not come from another attacking pattern or defensive system. It may come from helping players become more adaptable than their opponents.
Over the coming months, this series is not intended to present all the answers. Instead, it aims to start a conversation. Through data, coaching experiences and discussions with some of the game’s leading thinkers, we will explore a question that I believe deserves greater attention:
Are the moments between structure becoming the most important moments in modern rugby?
Because sometimes the future of a game does not begin with a new tactic. Sometimes, it begins with a different question.
South African players have always been powerful and physical, but the dividend from the shift theory taught by the likes of Tony Brown and Kennedy Tsimba is helping players become more adaptable than their opponents, and that is a new addition.
The proof of the pudding lies in the development at national level since the 2023 Rugby World Cup. At the 2025 Rugby Championship, South Africa topped the charts for tries scored off turnover ball with 13, seven more than the second-placed team Australia. It accounted for a massive 48% of their total try-scoring output.
In the URC 2025-26 season, the Bulls scored 24 tries off turnover, joint first in the competition with eventual league champions Leinster. The Professor would be silently nodding his approval at the improvements South African rugby has made.
Transitions or ‘shifts’ begin with the opening action of the game, from kick-offs. The first kick of the match usually signifies a change of possession from the kicking team to the receiving side, and the restarts thereafter occur at ‘chaotic’ or transformative psychological moments when one side has just scored points, and their momentum can either be reversed or reinforced on the next sequence of play.
The opening game of the ‘Greatest Rivalry’ tour illustrated how these moments can be exploited by a team attuned to the counter-attacking wavelength Wayne Smith and Kennedy Tsimba describe. The All Blacks ran the ball back at both of the first two kick-offs at the DHL stadium in Cape Town and the dynamics of the process are worth examination:
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 10, 2026
The home side start with a typical kick-off chase formation, with a 12-man chase, two defenders dropping to the backfield [#10 and #15] and the #9 hedging his bets in between the two lines of defence. The kick goes to the left – the forwards’ side – so that the remaining backs can protect the wide side of the field if the receiving team elects to run the ball back.
There are already some important ‘moments between structure’ of the sort Kennedy mentioned in his introduction. The Stormers scrum-half has not decided whether to join the front line or drop back, and there is a temporary imbalance with the chasing forwards and backs split to opposite sides of the field.
During his time as head coach of the Glasgow Warriors, Dave Rennie got more ‘pay’ from kick-off returns than any other coach in the URC, and exploited the opportunities presented by such moments outstandingly well. The All Blacks begin with a wide play dragging both of the Stormers’ centres towards open-side touch at 0:14, then pin them there with another short-side phase at 0:27, where all of numbers 12, 13 and 14 are trapped in or around a ruck only seven metres from the right [defensive] side-line.
This gives them a free shot at a midfield mismatch on the next play, with dynamic back-rower ball-carrier Peter Lakai lined up opposite two Capetonian props, #3 Neethling Fouché and #1 Vernon Matongo, and Lakai runs straight past Matongo on a long gallop upfield.
The second clean break from another kick-off return occurred only six minutes later:
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 10, 2026
The set-up is the same, with a longer kick to the left or forwards side, the Stormers’ three-quarters aligned to the right, 10 in the backfield and 9 hedging his bets on the left of the chase. One midfield phase is enough to split both of the home side’s centres to the right of the ruck, and between them #2 Samisoni Taukei’aho and #9 Cortez Ratima are able to evade a couple of weak tackles by front-rowers Matongo and André-Hugo Venter to create the mismatch break.
The same chase pattern from kick-off was pulled apart by the Pumas in the Argentina-South Africa encounter on the following evening:
— William Bishop (@RPvids1994) August 10, 2026
The key ‘moment between structures’ in this instance occurs when Springbok #9 Cobus Reinach decides to fill in on the line at 10:30 and leave the gap between the two lines of defence untenanted. With the Bok three-quarters looking to rush upfield on the right, the two factors combined open the space for a successful chip-and-regather into the space by Pumas #9 Simón Benítez-Cruz.
Those moments when the coaching picture changes are among the most interesting in the modern game, and Kennedy Tsimba is one of the men gleaning the lessons from them. What happens when structure breaks down? What happens when the challenge for coaches is no longer simply to build better systems, but to prepare players for the instant those systems dissolve? These are the questions we will explore in a series of articles in the coming weeks, as the Greatest Rivalry tour builds to a climax, and beyond.
Watch Rugby's Greatest Rivalry LIVE
Two rugby giants collide. Stream live, replays and highlights free on RugbyPass TV.
Nick Bishop, you smashed it again. Always a pleasure to read one of your articles. As a current player and a future coach, these are always gold.
Terrific and insightful read, thanks Nick
Great topic Nick.
Everyone has made the mistake of adopting Irelands methods, the ultimate example of structured brilliance. Choreographed imagination.
I was watching the Bay take on Canterbury for the shield in the weekend, and towards the end of the game when chasing teams have historically played their best rugby in new zealand, against tired defenders where you’re using all your reserves to add to get back and add to the play, their attack instead floundered.
Canterbury were seemingly happy to follow in the Champion Crusaders example of letting the opposition have the ball in controllable situations. Bay’s attack both struggled to get their own numbers back in time to fill their stereotypical structure and in it’s design to let the defence rush up also gave Canterbury time to reposition bodies into the defensive line to wait for the attack. They were even able to launch their own counter attacks from the oppositions desire to play the game by the book.
This is not an example (or topic) of the “Ireland Method”, they had gone onto refine that sort of aspect from it, but it has been a trap. One in which the All Blacks found themselves in last year, and Rennie may or may not be trying to get them out of this year (they still use many of the basic facets). As with some key personal changes in the All Blacks, all the Bay may have needed was for young Cashmore to step up into first receiver more for example. It is just this lack of understanding in what it achieves, and doesn’t that has sort of left a hole, for now.
It’s a shame you’re articles haven’t gone through to published faster.
On the last point, we all had a well-deserved break after the Nations Champs so did not get back in the saddle until this week for the Long Reads, so inevitably a bit of catch-up there.
In respect of your question, I do feel changes, or developments of national style have to be carefully weighed for benefit. Not all are really in the shop window when they appear to be!
Razor I felt had a vision but it was too far removed from what NZ has done historically. Rassie has added Tony-ball but the first round loss to the WBs last year showed how fine the margins are. I doubt he’ll move the Boks too far from their traditional strengths in this Test series.
In basketball the first thing you do when you get a defensive rebound or a steal or inbounding the ball every time every coach will tell you to look for the outlet first long pass for the “easy” basket or to the dudes who can push the ball up court on the break for the easy basket and finally same to get into your offense before D is set up
That’s where having dudes who can handle the ball and make those plays on the run are such an advantage more of them moreso.
Yep in the NBA ther was a big debate between structured ‘half-court’ teams and ‘fast-break’ sides like the Lakers wasn’t there? The Lakers themselves tried to play more structured under Paul Westhead until Magic threatened to quit and Westhead got the push!
Well Played All Blacks. That’s more like what we expect. Looking good for the test serties.
A very interesting game yesterday. At 24 nil at half time people in my group were predicting a sixty point winning margin. But the second half the AB’s only scored seven points more than the Bulls.
At 31 minutes there was a passage of play that is one of the longest passages I have seen for a very long time. The ball travelled in hand the length of the field three times without pause. After that passage the AB’s looked a lot more tired than the Bulls.
There was a passage early in the second half when four AB’s descended on a lone Bull who collected the ball ten meters from his line and still the AB’s couldn’t score. That was pure fatigue. Thirty minutes earlier there is no way they would not have scored from that.
Pretoria altitude more helpful than the most friendly ref.
The AB’s will be much more acclimatised by next Saturday.
According to physiological research, it takes 16 continuous days at altitude to build the red blood cell count to where the oxygen exchange is equal to what it is at sea level. Which is why Rassie kept most of his test match group in Joburg.
Obviously very fit players are less affected.
The ABs are still looking a little disjointed and have been careful to keep their top ppl under wraps, often cos of injury. Jordan, Roigard, Ardie and Lomax until Saturday were all held back. Their Test side will be a lot better, but the Boks represent a huge step up from what we’ve seen so far. Good effort from the tight five against a useful Bulls unit.
I’m not following your logic their Graham, but yes the same rushness is still present (that frustrated so many fans with Razors teams inability to finish). Hopefully improving though.
Some key contributors helped the Bulls make some good moments right, remember the first 80 minutes of their season.
Seconds out - round three.
Settling in early - going to watch SA women vs Fijiana.
I think a lot of people are going to get a big surprise about the big show today.
Interesting watching the japan Australia game - a bit like sitting down to a symphony which from start to finish is crescendo allegro.
Now for the real stuff.
Love the comments NB. Love to see the various perspectives. Rugby belongs to all of us.
Indeed it does, thanks D.
Jeesh the last thing we want is the Boks figuring out how to get their speed merchants more in the game especially when it is broken play I watch plenty of 7s and some of them may be little fellas but man have they got some wheels
And the likes of Cheslin, KLA and Edwill amazing in the air for small men!
Watching France socials saw them playing this game that was half touch half soccer with the round ball essentially no offsides you can play it off the foot like soccer score a goal or if you catch the ball its all on like touch with one touch being a turnover so all about keeping the ball alive when you pick it up ( still got to pass it backwards when in the hand) ..what a great game to create that chaos and work on offloading soft hands and the spacial awareness ..for sure popping the round ball and catching it is easier but still getting those juices flowing very clever
Very interesting!! I imagine Ramos and Penaud are pretty good at it!
Nick, since some of the South Africans are complaining about being compared to a (very good) all blacks side. You could use the Fijians as an example of thriving in chaos?
The way they play one touch rugby where you are forced to keep the ball alive at all costs until you see an opportunity. I once visited a friend from school there and one evening the whole village was playing! It’s is very interesting and effects the way they play and embrace absolute chaos
It’s s very sensitive time for them Toko😉
This is one in a series of pieces I’ll be doing with Kennedy so plenty of time to unwrap things in due course.
I may be biased but ……I think Australia is best suited to this fast moving style because we have such outstanding athletic talent, that hasn’t known whether it is arfa or marfa for years and years, due to truly hopeless coaching. Which is why we are languishing at 8.
We’ve been playing styles woefully ill suited to us.
It will be great to see teams get away from this rugby league like lineup across the field going crash bash, crash bash. It’s nauseating.
Chaos is where the excitement and fruit is. I’ve been amazed there hasn't been more use of the simple chip over the top to break up rigid defense lines.
It might take Australia a while to be reprogrammed back to their natural instincts of ‘ave a go ya mug’.
What do you mean you may be biased.
You are biased !!!!!!
It’s a little more specific than ‘fast-moving style’ tho OJ.
It’s about how quickly you can adapt to changing expectation and the chaos which ensues with a chnage of possession. The teams which are adjusting best to those scenarios right now are at the top of the tree..
This is the kind of rugby journalism that is so hard to come by.
Really looking forward to the rest of the series
Amen.
Many thanks Toko👍