I was never a fan but not even Jake was as stupid and ignorant as our new clown.
I dont ever recall feeling less enthusiastic about watching the Boks play.......what a sad state of affairs and to think, I think we have the best pool of talent today, since readmission and this is how our coach rewards us.
Thanks Heineke!!!!!......we need a visionary and insightful coach.......this conservatism is sickening
We will have to wait and see what team Meyer sends out. The game will be live here in NZL in the early hours of Monday morning so either I will be up watching before work or record it and hopefully not see any results all day. If that team listed resembles one that runs out, I will sleep in and cancel the recording.
Fuck this! Im not watching Bakkies Botha and them grind it out against Scotland when we should be watching our youth putting them to the sword.
Jake White has always been a better coach than Heineke Meyer.
I understand wanting Fourie to come back as there is concerns at 13 but last weekend, Fourie showed more negatives than positives imo...This is why I want him to start this week. Maybe he needed that game to shake the rust and get back into it..Ditto JP...If Fourie has another game where he looks far behind the pace of test rugby, then Serfontein or JJ need to come back in for the French. How can we bring one of them in for the French when they have had no/little game time this tour in these different conditions.
At least Jake had a plan. His four years in charge involved ticking boxes off along the way to eventually win the WC..Heineke seems like he has no plan and is playing game for game. Extremely short sighted...He has to be prepared to be under pressure with the new guys because thats how they get better and grow as players and as a squad!
How can we go to a WC or into another RC with guys who we have not seen perform under pressure?
Maybe Meyer has a plan and hopefully it will pay off but I cant help but think he reckons he will have success with guys who have been successful in the past. Times have changed. Evolve Heineke!
Its all about results - but it is also about building a team for the future - and that does not mean using players that is way past their best and no hope for the future. Granted Meyer wants tow in against Scotland - but the idea is not to recycle the players who struggled to beat Scotland last year as well as in June this year.
What Meyer did here was to weaken the team considerably from the team that played in June. Examples are the following:-
* Startng the with Gurthro Steenkamp at rop after he failed at Murrayfield last year and as recently as 14 days ago failed miserably in a club game playing for Toulouse. Bringing him off the bench on Saturday - the first scrum collapsed and Steenkamp was penalized. What can this fat and unfit player bring to Springbok rugby in future? Nothing and tat is a fact/
* He rushed in to bring in Fourie for the game last week. Even a blind person could see that Fourie is slow and not test match fit - he let Davies run past him as I he was not there repeatedly. This player left for Japan two years ago and playing on a much lower level with comparatively few matches per year - he has gone backwards massively from the player he used to be. Will he get better in future? Definitely not with the training regime he is using at present. De Villiers - more or less the same age - once said that he must train much harder now then ever before - to ensure that he keeps on performing at the level he used to be three years ago. It shows that it works - provided that the player trains much harder. Will it work in the relaxed environment in Japan - not likely at all.
* Pietersen has made his name in 2007 in the WC when he was still very young. Since then he has slowed down in speed substantially and he has become more of a defending player than an attacking player. That is proved by the fact that in both 2008 and 2013 he was the only frontline (international) wing ever to score a single try in Super 15. He still is a strong runner with ball in hand - but his contribution in attack is questionable and in defence there are serious question marks about his speed. However, last week against Wales it became evident that he was slower in the game than he was ever before. Despite his massive reputation one has to question his selection - apparently based on reputation and definitely not on the form he showed last week.
* Bakkies Botha at 34 years of age is playing club rugby - ie a lower level of rugby than is being played in Super 15 and Premier Division CC. Is he still capable to produce the goods. Judging on the foreign-based players from France and Japan it is highly unlikely to produce the goods and at his age he is inevitable on the way down. What future Is there in selecting a player like him?
This idea to hark back to players of the past and not invest in younger players - are destructive and destroy the interest of younger players to improve and force their way into the team. What message does Meyer send to the players concerned? The clear message is - I am not interested at all - I am perfectly happy playing players who are playing club rugby in foreign countries based on reputation - I do not mind whether there is improvement in team performances as long as we can scrape home and win games against teams like Scotland.
It is for the above reason that I fully agree with Saffex in what he wrote above. Meyer pays lip service to improvement in Springbok rugby - but when the chips are down - he does nothing constructive about it. Choose the losers of the past (ie 2010 and 2011) - that is the way to go - and hope through some miracle that we still win the games. His record against Argentina was slightly better than last year - and everybody basically scream improvement because we were better against Australia - problem is it happened not because we were so good - but rather because they are having a dip in form.
Harking back to the past is not the foundation to build rugby for the future.
Beeno
Bringing in older players to test them - is absolute rubbish. Steenkamp was tested for a year now and basically produced nothing of note. If Meyer did not see the deficiencies of Fourie and Pietersen last week - he must go for an eye test. Now it is he turn of Bakies - a 34 year old player - to "test him - that really is macabre.
You yourself writes that Carter and McCaw is going down in form - I agree with you on that - but you support the Bakkies bullshit. Then comes the classical claim - Thorn played in the last WC at 36 - why not Bakkies? Thorn was there to fill up the teamsheet - he produced nothing of note. The same will be with Bakkies.
Meyer is not too deep for anybody - he is shallow since he keeps on selecting his past greats who helped him to win the Super 15 trophy - they must be the best a decade later. That does not show depth - it shows a harkening back to the past and disregarding the present.
Cleancut
Don't get me wrong - I like fat people - they are so funny in real life, it is unbelievable - normally friendly with a great sense of humour. So I like fat Alberts and fatter Steenkamp.
That does not mean that they are successful rugby players - sad to say. If they are working on the conditioning of Steenkamp - it is not working. I watched the Toulouse game two weeks ago and Fat Steenkamp was a bloody farce - no sign of improvement there I am afraid.
Every time I see Fat Alberts - I see in my minds eye the miss tackle of Alberts on Read in the Ellis Park test and how he fell over his own feet when their was a ball to be recovered - terrible recollections - an indicator for me that our prop masquerading as a loosie was just not god enough.
We just need to compare Meyer with our two most successful couches. Kitch Christy and Jake White. Both took an ordinary bunch of players and turned them into world champions. Kitch had less time but decided to stick with what he knew and that was to select predominately Lions players. He even deliberately left out certain players to keep the harmony in the team. Provincial rivalries were far bigger back then. Tiaan Straaus who was one of our better 8’s was left out for Francouis Pienaar who was an average player but had all the required leadership skills.
Jakes approach was to invest in youth. The team that help him win the trinations in 2004 was much different to the team that played in 2003. The reason, he didn’t have any loyalties to any players. He got rid of Barry, Joubert, Paulse etc and replaced them with younger players in Fransh Steyn, De Villiers, Fourie, JP Pietersen, Habana etc.
The only way he could get them ready was to expose them to the rigours of test rugby. Take the loss and believe that in the long term it would pay off. It worked so well that it made Pieter de Villiers coaching record look much better than it was.
So my point, short term coaches should stick with what they know but there has to come a time where you have to take risk and back youngsters and sacrifice the results. The proof will come next year and we will have to see who he invest in but based on his selections I don’t believe that he is backing any youngsters. There is absolutely no point in having bakkies, Fourie and steenkamp in the team and the same can be said of Pienaar. I would rather have Reinach, Schreuder and Van Zyl Playing off the bench behind Fourie Du Preez. Give them all equal chances and pick your winner.Ceradyne, if you read my whole post you would notice that I compared two styles of how to get to your end goal. McIntosh was a really poor coach and got fired because he could not get the results. The only Natal players that I could recall was Mark Andrews, James Small and Andre Joubert who were all world class players, Joubert being the Rolls Royce of fullbacks. The core of the squad was Lions players which Christie coached. Christie had the hardest of all the jobs as he only had 12 months to turn a really bad bok team into world beaters with the weight of the entire nation on his shoulders, talk about pressure. You can’t accredit Mcintosh for that.
White was successful with his first team in 2004 because he was adventures and allowed his team to play with freedom. He actually only won 2 out 4 games but managed to get 3 bonus points which meant that we won the Tri-Nations. In the final game against the all blacks we completely destroyed them at Ellis park because by that stage the boks were conditioned to play an expansive game where as when Meyer tried it and it completely backfired.
The point here is that Meyer needs at some stage transition over from the players he knows and the veterans to the players that would serve us better. You can’t tell me that in having so many foreign based and old players in the squad will mean we would become the best in the world. My fear is that next year Australia will be much stronger and playing in the style that Mckenzie wants them to play. What is he going to do when he loses all his games to NZ and Aus. He tried it last year when he panicked and started to select youngsters to patch the hole without implementing a proper plan. Is he going to do the same?
Jake found 2 older players and built his team around them. Os Durant who had a world cup medal and Percy Montgomery. You have to credit him for his vision. Montgomery matured as a player and it is hard to believe that this guy got boo’ed of the field. Both of these players featured in the final. Montgomery gave him that stability to get the points but he didn’t compromise his game plan to substitute it for a robotic pivot. He wanted a player that can play flat. Jaco VderWesthuizen did that but whent to Japan and came back rubbish the following year. He got cut from the team but he showed that he wanted a 10 that can attack and that he recognise you need the points and knew that having a fullback that can get you the 3 and 2’s but who are rock solid at the back and that have an attacking flair can win you the game.
He did not hang on to old has-been’s, if they didn’t perform they got the chop and if White was coaching now he would have probably got rid of J Fourie, Pietersen, Steenkamp, Steyn etc.
Meyer has to back the young players so that they can learn in the June and Nov test and it would prepare them for the rigours of Championship rugby but what he has done is to use journeymen such as Kruger and Kirchner that simply just don’t fit in at all.
If the youngsters fail, don’t discard them, he has to back them until they get it right, Clivewoord did it, White did it and Henry did it in 2009.
Meyer actually did really poor last year and he failed to make a big impact and that was because of his blind faith in useless players.
Cleancut
First of all - you like another retard on this site keep on referring to Os du Rand and his call -up by White as a precedent for Meyer doing the same. Os was a singular/unique case - the difference is Meyer is wanting the whole 2011 squad back. There is a difference here also - Os was in SA and when he returned to the Free State and later the Springboks. Meyer's selections are playing touch rugby fror clubs in France and Japan - and there is no real control over their training programmes. Be it as it may - there is a huge difference - White wanted one player back from a decade earlier back in a critical position, Meyer wants a major part of the 2010-11 players back irrespective of whether they are critically required or not.
The problem with Meyer is that he does not want change. He is saying that he can get the over 30 year olds back into form - but in reality he has no control over their training programmes and gym work - since they are all playing for foreign clubs.
The problem is that Meyer will stick with players like Steenkamp - even though Toulouse normally does not include him in their starting line up - they hope that he can keep up scrums when the second string CLUB players come on or when the opposition prop has been tired out. None of the opposition he meets on test level are second string club players. What does he want to achieve by using a player like Steenkamp then?
His apparent disregard of Du Toit - and especially also his downgrading of Etzebeth is disgusting. He wants Bakkies at all costs and since Van der Merwe fir the first time did well in a test last week - he is now prepared to discard Etzebeth as well. What reasonable coach would do that? If Bakkies makes no obvious flaws in the game tomorrow, but does nothing of note as well - Meyer would sing his praises like it is unbelievable. Botha would be the future no 4 with no place in the team for Etzebeth. Does that not tell you something?
It tells me that Meyer is a backward looking coach - not a forward looking one. He will be lauded by retards for doing just that - but it does not bode well to continue playing players that was great at one time - but let us down badly in 2010 and 2011. Meyer may regard them as the future of SA Rugby, but they are bad news and we can expect some real disappointments next year and in 2015.
For the future of SA rugby it may be best if the Springboks lose tomorrow - it might just teach Meyer he is on the wrong path, but then that may not work either - since Meyer never seems to learn when it comes to player selection.
Steenkamp and Alberts are not fat...the former could do with a little bit of conditioning but that's all...Olly Le Roux was a fatty but could he move around...watched him play squash at Kloof often...really good and quick. The story about Os and Jake is true though.
But this is NOT the point...there are are plenty of youngsters...Alberts is young although Guthro isn't.
Saffex
There are a few things that todays game has illustrated clearly. Those are that both Bakkies and Fourie are past it. I just wonder whether Meyer has note what was going on and am waiting for his praise singing about them.
Alberts is another player who are not really a live-wire. He does carry balls - but never really effectively. He still only average about two meters per carry - which means he is basically tackle by the first opposing player. Since he normally has a low tackle count against stronger teams - I do think that he is of limited use to the Springboks and not indispensable like many on this Boar carry on about.
Steenkamp is another to go now - he is just not a good enough scrummager.
I think that Meyer will have a different opinion on the players mentioned though and his praise will be skyhigh. If that be the case - he must have his head read.
Jake and Heynecke can not be compared.
Jake coached in an era for the Boks where transformation was a hot topic. After a dismal 03' WC under Straueli, the blacks were in full voice. Every test Jake was in charge of, he was basically told what team to select. Heynecke never has as much pressure on him to play guys that should not be anywhere near the squad but their skin colour gets them a free ride!
Jake explains all in his book and I dont reckon one word is a stretch of the truth.
Heynecke is a good coach but I would like to see how he goes when he is told to put a team together and make sure it includes enough players of colour!
Bearing in mind, we do have better players of colour coming through in 2013 than we did in 2003 but I still reckon Heynecke would battle.
Jake had to waste a hooker bench spot on Shimange who never really got more than the last 5mins of a test match if he was lucky. That is a key position where you need 2 guys to play a big part on the day. Conradie and Januarie playing over Pienaar and sometimes Du Preez...Madness..
