Baby Boks: Black Gold

After the baby boks limp performance, just had a quick scan through some of the players that are in the squad. Saffex normally knows all these guys, but what really stood out is the black players for me. Some have amazing high light clips and others have really gotten bigger in size. Gone are the days of smaller black players. 

Lets looks at who they are. 

Lithele Bester 1.87m, 92kg, Outside centre, Sharks, amazing schools clips of him breaking the line, playes for Natal and have some serious pace. What I like about him is his work rate and running smart angles. Henco Van Wyk need to watch out for this kid. 

Phatu Ganyanke 1.85, 123kg, prop, Sharks, got bossed around in the scrum by Georgia, but then again. Georgia is a formidable scrumming team and have a long history of producing scrum masters. 

Mdande 1.89m , 132kg, tighthead prop, Bulls, again, solid unit, one for eh future, but struggled against Georgia. 

NDabambi 1.95m, 100kg, 8 man, Bulls, got some serious height, but lacked some punch and ball carrying. Will need to bulk up to make that height work to his advantage. 

Letebele 1.87 m, 92kg, Bulls, Ouside Centre, seemed to be lost at see or just never got the ball in the game. But has the physique. 

kunene, 1.83m, 90kg, Natal, Fullback, didn't have a big impact on the game, lacks defence 

Mshali, 1.87m, 92kg, WP, Good size, but lacked gas subbed half way through the game. 

Jurenzo Julius, 1.78m, 96kg, Centert / Winger Natal - School boys 13 player, but ended up on the wing. Built like a south sea islander and was a live wire in the game. Should he not have gone to 13? Although, noting that there is another baby bok from the sharks who is also a 13, wonder if it was the right choice for him to got the sharks. 

There you have it, we have some decent athletes in the team and some of them have fantastic highlights real. Let's just hope that they can develop at their unions. 

Ultimately, on paper we have talented bunch of players and it is nice to see the black players coming through. Not to mention that they seem to have gotten bigger in size, matching that of the Afrikaner players. 

The props need to catch a wakeup, the have the timber but need to learn to scrum or it will be a very short career. 

If you want to check out more about these players, visit this link

https://all.rugby/match/18894/u20-championship-2023/southafrica-u20-georgia-u20

Is Sherwood the kid that plays for Bishops, saw some highlights of him and he looked amazing. That is if we are talking about the same player. 

I've not seen much of Mambo, I also think that he might not qualify for the U20 due to age but was selected last year. 

One thing is is for certain, we definitely have a lot of talented players, but the real trick is being able to harness all of this talent and find a spot where they understand their role and that it is about the team. 

I know, SA fans boast so much about the talent that we have, it is insane. But for some reason our rugby administrators and coaches fuck it up. 

I'm just looking at the the teams from the last 2 or 3 years, man there is so much talent you can build an entire URC team out of them and they will win it for you in 2 years time. 

One think that Haneke Meyer did well, is to get all of the SA young talent together and made them part of the bulls team. Pollard is WP boy, Kriel is WP etc, but go lured to play for the bulls. 

So maybe the lions can try to bull them all together and build a formidable team 

Ja, I think as for breaking into the URC team, these boys going to find it difficult, but I would really love to see our URC franchises embrace the youth players in the way that Leinster has. There is definitely a gap from age group to senior rugby. 

I don't varsity cup is the right place for them. It is really entertaining and has a lot of hype but doesn't get player ready. 

What you want is players to have had at least 20 senior games by the age of 23. That way you know whether they should stick around or not. 

As for the Stormers, they did try that 19 year old, Hartzenberg but he did his knee and will be out for a while. 

But I think there should be room for him to come into the mix. Stormers has mainly been playing Dan Du Pu Plesis who played most of the games and was the URC best 12. Nel has been playing at 13 and they have used Willemse at 12 as well as Sacha Feinberg. 

If I look at the talent at the Sharks, Stormers and Bulls, I would definitely use the overseas games to send these guys on as well as the Heineken cup, not bother in trying to win. Do what Leinster does and use it as development game. 

The season is long, 25 games are plenty for your squad. Not to mention that players normally perform best when they play under 20 games per season. We saw what happened to the bulls

Same speculation as for the 8 who went named as best player of the tournament (speculation that turned into a prediction)

They will struggle to peddle their trade in SA and clubs in the North will have to provide them with opportunities.

No talent in there as SA rugby will never drill a quota player to be a quality player.

And a burden to come for northern clubs that will have to take bullets for the team, to keep the walking corpse that is SA rugby walking.

I agree, it is almost when the players go into professionalism that all those attributes that made them so valuable gets coached out of them. 

It has been going on for many years. 

But, looking at the players at their disposal, wonder how you these players going to crack it. 

Dan du plesis is playing sublime rugby at the moment. 

Then, looking at the baby bok team, there seems to be a number of good centre options. I think they went for the black player over the white player. 

Also, looking at Mambo, him and Sacha should be bossing that 10, 12 axis. 

What we do need is depth at 13, but we have Suleman Hartzenberg. 

So what I'm trying to say, there are only 4 teams. 

But I do believe that they can get game time. 

I really like what Dobbo has done this season. He has played all 50 players in his squad in the URC. That is incredible come to think about it. 

If they other unions can do the same then we will definitely see an improvement in our rugby. 

Perhaps that can also invest in 5 year contracts to keep them at home.  

Or telling them to stop playing rugby, a sport that has no future in SA and even less, opportunities for them.

France vs New  Zealand tomorrow and playing lock for France is this 18 year old Posolo Tuilagi from Samoa.150 kg and 6 ft 4" 
Maybe its been the Covid for an untested AB junior team but its gonna be a hard day in Paarl tomorrow for them.
Looking forward to the Australia vs Ireland clash at 11am....always see those two as a derby game.