Andy Colquhoun in Parramatta RUGBY Reporting on the Springboks occasionally puts one in mind of what it may have been like tramping in the wake of Caesar’s army as it marched into Germania each summer to campaign against the Visigoths (the author and proprietors of the Mail & Guardian in no way vouch for the historical accuracy of the forgoing sentence).
It’s a long way from home, the combat is brutal and back home the citizens of Rome recline on their loungers and plot the succession while Caesar’s back is turned. Ian McIntosh and Carel du Plessis both returned from Australasia not to receive a laurel wreath but a dagger between the shoulder blades. And here in Sydney the distant rasp of steel being sharpened has filtered through to the Springbok camp. Three successive defeats leave Nicholas Mallettus vulnerable and he should beware the Ides of August, never mind March. So you might be surprised to hear that the MM legion (that’s Roman numerals for 2000) are upbeat, determined and collectively not prepared to be sidetracked. Caesar, in his own words, is “phlegmatic”.
Actually he’s phlegmatic and relaxed but don’t interpret that for either resigned to dismissal or complacent. Mallett remains fiercely competitive, continues to hate each defeat with a passion and, in private, might wish that all of his players were as personally insulted by a loss. It appears that the verdict at home is that the wheels have come off the chariot but here in the Sydney suburb of Parramatta there’s a very real feeling that they’re actually only just being put on. That probably isn’t what supporters want to read back home. The cry of “Caesar is dead, long live Caesar” already appears to have gone up (for instance, at least one journalist on this tour has been advised by his sports editor to beware of appearing to back a losing cause).
But I think I can sniff out the rotting flesh of a decaying team well enough and it has been noticeably absent on this tour. I was 40 this week and in two decades of reporting on professional rugby league, cricket, English Premiership soccer and professional rugby union I think I know the signs. One of the first things that happens is that the coach stops talking to the media at about the same time the media start getting the blame for the results (I have never followed a team where the media was praised for the results). The players start blaming the coach for the mistakes they make on the field and the coach starts blaming the players. The laager may be a peculiarly South African concept but I’ve seen cricket captains, rugby league coaches as well as dozens of English soccer managers dive for it as soon as the heat is turned up. But this week the press were invited to the Springbok team dinner on Wednesday at the end of what has been a long and – in terms of results – fraught tour and if this is a team at each other’s throats then they’ve done a damn fine job of disguising it. Yes, I know, they keep losing but Alex Ferguson was one result away from being sacked by Manchester United until he finally got his side playing the way he wanted them to play. Another thing I hope I’ve learned is perspective. Covering the England soccer team I was far less agitated than my colleagues by the fact that the team always lost the big games because England’s record was that in the big games they usually lost. In fact their record was that they struggled to even get to the big games. The Springboks’ record since 1992 is that they lose to Australia and New Zealand. They lost to them in 1992 and 1993 and 1994 and in 1996 when they were playing to the traditional strengths to which we now hear they are supposed to return. And they lost to them in 1997 and 1999 when the coach was trying to find a new way of playing. The only winning years came in 1995 -when they exclusively played at home – and in 1998 when they were damn lucky that Matt Burke and Carlos Spencer missed their kicks, as the coach on those days – Mallett – invariably points out. If you add in the fact that South Africa’s Super 12 record is shaming then you do not have the picture of a nation that is going to send out 15 players who can routinely beat the Wallabies and All Blacks by continuing to do the same things in the same way. Let’s cut to the chase. The calls for Mallett’s head are about agendas. For many people he is too “Cape” and too English, too abrasive and too damn sure of himself, and never mind the results or why he might be heading in the direction he is taking; the man clearly needs taking down a peg or two. If you disagree ask yourself this question: why hasn’t anyone placed South Africa’s most successful Super 12 coach of the past two years into the succession frame? It’s because that man is Alan Solomons, too “Cape”, too English and so on. And now the president of the South African Rugby Football Union, Silas Nkanunu, a man who determinedly called the Springbok captain Andre Venter before the departure, has been sharpening his knife.
Et tu, Brute.