South Africa’s newspapers called for a mass resignation of the country’s rugby administrators on Monday after the national side’s ”humiliating” defeat to New Zealand in the World Cup.
”What we were served up [in the match] was so humiliating that I cannot think of any other response than that the enitre leadership of SA Rugby has to go,” the editor of the Johannesburg-based Business Day said of the Springboks’ 29-9 quarterfinal defeat on Saturday.
”Rian Oberholzer [the chief executive of SA Rugby], Silas Nkanunu [the president of the South African Rugby Football Union] and the captain, Corne Krige, have had their chances.
”If there was honour in any of them they would resign on their return.”
The Cape Town-based Cape Times led on its front page with Oberholzer refusing to quit and pledging his support to Springbok coach Rudolf Straeuli.
”I hear there are calls for blood,” Oberholzer told the newspaper.
”Rudolf has my full backing, and as for myself, I do not select the team or run on to the field to play,” he said.
Cape Town’s Afrikaans-language Die Burger newspaper dedicated most of its front page to the Springboks’ woes.
”Tears roll as calls for management and coaches heads mount,” a headline on the newspaper’s front-page said.
It quoted Straeuli saying the World Cup had come one year too soon for the young South African team.
”Hard work lies ahead for us,” Straeuli said. ”What the World Cup showed was that we need experience.”
Former South African coach Nick Mallet, writing in the Johannesburg-based Sunday Times, said the game in Melbourne was ”not even a match, just a mugging”.
”There needs to be a mass resignation — from the president, the vice-president and the managing director of South African rugby down,” he said. ”These men have not been successful at any level.”
The Springboks, he said, had gone from being the best team in the world in 1995, when they won the World Cup in Johannesburg, ”to a rabble”. — Sapa-AFP