Jake White is a canny coach in many ways. After the deflation of Saturday night in Dublin and a nightmare journey to a Richmond hotel some way short of the standard expected by touring teams these days, he cancelled practice on Monday and had one brief session on Tuesday.
This not only helped ease some aching bones, but also kept the Springboks fresh for the plethora of functions they are expected to attend whenever they visit London these days. Beat England at Twickenham on Saturday and everyone will be praising White’s laissez faire attitude: lose and he will discover for the first time exactly how onerous the task of coaching the Springboks can be.
White’s predecessor as coach, Rudolf Straeuli, would not have been as sanguine towards his players. No doubt he, and many others who have held the poison chalice in the past, would have organised a koppestamp session to exorcise the ghosts of defeat against Ireland. White chose to show the squad some home movies instead.
With his finger poised over the pause button, White was thus able to point out a few home truths to his players. They lost because they did not control the ball. Even though Ireland played well and Kiwi referee Paul Honiss had a particularly bad day at the office, the defeat boiled down to that one aspect.
The questions asked in training this week centred on why the team could not control the ball and how things could be improved. It has become clear from White’s coaching tenure that wholesale changes will not be seen as any kind of a solution. Ashwin Willemse has gone home with a broken toe, so Jean de Villiers will start on the wing. That will be the only forced change.
Many armchair critics would like to see Schalk Burger dropped for incurring two yellow cards in successive tests, and mindful of this White went on the offensive this week. Far from blaming his workaholic flanker he went out of his way to defend him. In this case the law was not an ass, but the arbiters of the law were.
Honiss and touch judge Paddy O’Brien laboured under a game-long illusion that Burger was some kind of criminal recidivist and that they were doing the game a favour by stopping him from playing.
They should both be reminded of the story about the great cricketer, WG Grace, who, when bowled out in a charity match, simply knocked the stumps back in and told the bowler: ”They’ve come to see me bat, not you bowl.”
Burger and his ilk – George Smith, Phil Waugh, Serge Betsen, Richie McCaw – are good for the game. He is not always innocent, but on Saturday he was far more sinned against than sinning. It was wise indeed of the coach to recognise that fact, for if Burger had been dropped for the England game, Andy Robinson would have laughed all the way to the post-match function.
Burger is South Africa’s most precious resource, but if there is one criticism that might hold water after the Ireland game it is that White has a habit of not maximising those resources. He has a stubborn streak that appears to militate against major tactical reshuffles within a game.
At Lansdowne Road conditions proved far more benign than predicted, but early in the second half it was clear that the game would not be won by any kind of razzle-dazzle from Jaco van der Westhuyzen at flyhalf. With half an hour left it would have been a good idea to get him off and allow the booming boot of Gaffie du Toit to kick the Boks into scoring positions.
Equally, there seemed no reason to put the Bulls’ super sub, Danie Rossouw, on the bench if he was not going to be used. There were sound tactical reasons for selecting AJ Venter on the side of the scrum, but it was clear by half time that his lack of game time was counting against him and Rossouw should have replaced him.
Ironically, in Christchurch during the Tri-Nations, White replaced Venter with 10 minutes to go when he should have kept him on. The reason then was that he had nailed his colours to the mast early in the tour, saying that Joe van Niekerk (like Venter now, on the road back from long-term injury) would get game time against the All Blacks.
But if the worst that can be said of this Bok side is that they failed to make the most of their resources, then there is really not too much wrong. The team was accused of lacking urgency against the Irish, but to a large extent they were simply whistled out of the game by Honiss.
The New Zealander didn’t allow a scrum to be completed for the first half hour and that simply allowed the Irish off the hook. In addition his criminal negligence during the scoring of Ronan O’Gara’s try should preclude him from ever refereeing at this level again, but the International Rugby Board being the paper tiger it is, no such sanction is likely to be manifested.
The good news for the Boks is that this week’s referee is the Irishman of Belgian extraction, Alain Roland. The bad news is that the opposition is contesting the title of underdog, being in a major post World Cup rebuilding process. It would be unwise to underestimate the English, but given a fair roll of the dice and blow of the whistle, South Africa should get back to winning ways.