Bok player ratings ...Houwig

This from Rugby 24's Houwig "Andries Coetzee: 6 Suitably steady once more, if not quite spectacular yet in the last line of defence. Usually demonstrated safe hands when necessary and came within a hair’s breadth of being credited with a second-half try, TV replays suggesting he had been halted just short. Raymond Rhule: 4.5 Hmm, there could yet be scope for change in the No 14 jersey, which is not Rhule’s more natural positioning anyway. Desperately few attack chances, but signs of frailty in tackle situations. Jesse Kriel: 7 At times, reminded of some of his striking 2015 exploits at outside centre for the Boks. A decisive early leg-tackle got his evening off to a fine start, and always sought to be constructive, energetic. Clinical finish for his first-half try at corner flag." Jan Serfontein: 8 Cherry on top of an inspired series before the Jo’burg faithful: looked totally at home and in charge at No 12. Grafted feverishly, including winning turnovers and even a productive lineout catch to paste in his scrapbook, and one knife-like break only foiled by desperate French ankle-tap. Courtnall Skosan: 5.5 So little space to work his renowned offensive magic in, which was a shame. Good composure, though, and gutsy aerial ball win a split second before being illegally, awkwardly dumped and badly winded. Elton Jantjies: 6.5 Not quite as dominating in general play as he had been at Kings Park, but another promising, unruffled showing all the same. Cleared calmly despite a few ropey passes coming his way, and again largely dead-eye off the kicking tee. Francois Hougaard: 4.5 One notably misfiring link, alas. Always keen as mustard, including engineering a steal, but shortcomings in composure and game-management, plus a few wobbly passes let him down. Ross Cronje will stay at front of scrumhalf pile for the moment ... Jean-Luc du Preez: 6 Perhaps understandably, not nearly as convincing in his late, enforced switch to No 8 as he had been one Test earlier as a thunderous blindside flank early substitute. A few really firm, drive-back tackles, though. Jaco Kriel: 6.5 Always endeavoured to do things at a pleasingly high tempo, although curtailed by not-ideal emergency deployment as a No 7, to which he is not best suited in his game style. Still, he won a turnover or two, cleaned up an untidy lineout and had a turbo-charged early rampage. Siya Kolisi: 6.5 Game of his life in Durban, so the Big Smoke was always going to be a difficult, slightly hiding-to-nothing follow-up. Still highly effective at breakdowns, however, and his tackles were usually proper “stoppers”. Franco Mostert: 7.5 Trojan … as always, really, whether for Boks or Lions. Consistently good (and sometimes vital) tackling, solid clean-outs and reassuring ruck protection of colleagues. Penalised once for being off feet at breakdown. Eben Etzebeth: 8 Captaincy element to his scorecard as already discussed above. As player, got about the park zestfully and his physical presence and legal brutality always apparent. Amazing wrestler’s strength to power over try-line from centre Serfontein’s unexpected lineout claim. Ruan Dreyer: 5.5 Lots of hair ruffling for the debutant as he won a scrum penalty at only the second set-piece. But then he conceded two or three at scrum-time to leave some question marks. Made final offload for Kriel’s try; some cause for satisfaction. Malcolm Marx: 5.5 Worked healthily on the deck, but his “basics” fell short in this one, with some lineout throw-in angst and, once, a costly fumble in a budding maul initiative. Tendai Mtawarira: 5.5 Inescapable feeling that the Beast remains in “cruise” mode. Put in his share of honest defensive grunt, especially in first half where Boks sported only a third of territory, but still waiting for the firebrand player of 2009 to truly resurface. Leaked penalty for high tackle. Standout substitute: Steven Kitshoff: 7.5 Played like a man possessed in the 25 minutes he got, and after 13 Test appearances it is a travesty he has not yet had a start. Got stuck in everywhere … carrying very powerfully, tackling, and also showing sublime hand skills in one offload instance.

Fairly good ratings methinks. Stepfontein had a strong game...in the Brad Barrett mode, turnovers and tackling. But I still can't see him worrying the AB or Aussie defence. Rhule has to go for the RC, he simply cant tackle...he missed 5 of 8 tackle attempts. Hougaard remains a lucky packet. Dreyer will never survive against the top props. Kleintjie Kriel is also overmatched at this level. Kolisi and du Preez were much less convincing than last week.

Do you know the overall tackle count?

The problem is that the game plan used by Meyer and Ludeke as well as the one used by Coetzee last year destroyed backline play and essentially the centers.   It was a case where any backline play was destroyed because of Meyer's and Ludeke's belief that SA has no skilled backline players.  
That reduced the role of backline players to defend and crashball.   Instead the idea was to substitute backline players by the passing of balls amongst the forwards.  
Serfontein benefited from the new approach by Smith and Venter and Serfontein is for the first tie since 2012 playing his natural style.   I like very much what is now coming to the fore.  
I think the same would happen when Pollard is brought into the set up.  Under new coaching he woul d stop being a kicking dummy and show much more enterprise.     

You may be right Mike, the change in Step's play is quite noted. Maybe he has been supressed, although in 2013 and notably in the Ellis Park test the Boks gave free reign to open play. I still favour Janse who has the strength to prize open a really good defence. ... Den the Boks made 101 of 124 tackles for an 81% success ratio....France only made 75% of their tackles. And France outgained us 383 to 337 metres and beat 23 defenders to our 17. .. There is an argument that these three wins had more to do with French mistakes....ie our long standing ability to attack effectively from turnover ball. It's going to be an interesting RC.

 101 Is too high against an average side, I'd say it would be even higher against a great attacking side like the AB's and if that's the case the Boks will lose by big scores.