If this World Cup has taught us anything it is that too much preparation can be stifling. It is plain madness to spend four years preparing for a tournament that might be decided by the whim of a referee.
The moral is: empower the team you have and remind them that the World Cup is an adventure, not a destination. To win the World Cup, New Zealand’s coach Graham Henry was given unprecedented power by the New Zealand Rugby Football Union (NZRFU). Last year he asked for permission to play two different All Black teams on a tour of Britain and Ireland.
The result was a Grand Slam shared equally by 30 players who all contributed on the field. This year Henry asked for permission to rest 22 All Blacks from the first seven weeks of the Super 14. The result was an unprecedented number of home defeats of Kiwi sides and an all South African final won by the Bulls.
At the time, of course, it was swept under the carpet. It was good for the competition to see South African sides doing well and Henry was prepared to sacrifice Super 14 success for the Webb Ellis Trophy.
It all seems a little different now. Springbok coach Jake White has pointed out several times this year that his squad, filled as it is with Bulls and Sharks, has lost its fear of travel and of losing to the New Zealanders. Ultimately, that is the monster created by the NZRFU’s lassitude with Henry.
As for Australia, the other Tri-Nations side eliminated at the quarterfinal stage, an accident waiting to happen finally found a venue. The Wallaby tight five, and particularly the front row, has been dreadful for several years. Australia’s talented backs have prospered, however, due to some clever (that is, illegal) scrumming tactics and a succession of myopic and gullible referees.
Against England it seemed that Irish referee Alain Rolland got his scrum penalties out of his system early. In the second half, despite numerous collapses, he gave only two free kicks, both against Australia. This allowed England to dominate in the only way they know how and loose head prop Andrew Sheridan deservedly won the man of the match award.
The Springboks have been arguing for years that the Wallabies scrum illegally and finally, on the biggest stage of all, the Australian machine imploded. All of which is good news for South Africa, but even better news for their semifinal opponents, Argentina.
It has been many years since the Pumas employed the famous ”Bajada” scrumming tactic. The idea of the Bajada was that eight men became one and that, instead of ”hooking” the ball back from the put in, they walked forward as a unit over the ball. It demanded extreme concentration and faith in the ability of every member of the pack to act as one. These days the Puma scrum is more conventional, but it still has the ability to move mountains. The chances of South Africa winning their way through to the final depends upon finding a way to combat it.
One way of doing that would be to ignore it. If the Boks get sucked into a macho forward battle, they will lose. The Pumas are as big, strong and as skilful as the Boks. They also have a scrumhalf who knows how to get the best out of his forward platform and a flyhalf who can drop goals with either foot.
If the Boks are to win, they need to use the pace and skill of their outside backs, which means transferring the ball adroitly, something that South African teams of the last decade have not always been very successful at doing. Thankfully, the Eddie Jones influence has improved this aspect of the Bok game tenfold.
It is a fact that will be dragged out innumerable times before Sunday’s match, South Africa has never lost against Argentina. The closest they came was in Port Elizabeth in 2003. With three minutes to go the Pumas led 25-16, but Brent Russell scored a converted try and Louis Koen nailed a penalty on full time to snatch a 26-25 victory.
There is every possibility that Sunday’s match will be as nail-biting as the 2003 encounter. The good news is that the quality of the game is sure to be miles better, for the Boks were clueless in 2003 and things only got worse when they went to the World Cup.
This has been a tournament devoted to the triumph of the underdog and even if Argentina lose at the semifinal stage, they have surely done enough to cement a place at the top table. For the Boks it is a case of one more hurdle to overcome to replicate the feat of the blessed class of 1995. White has said before he is confident he has the team to win a final. But has he a team to win a semifinal?