Other than pole-kicking, I am not seeing much from Pollard. He does not seem like an athlete anymore. Perhaps some of the leg operations have reduced his abilities.
If Libok could kick, I would prefer him over Pollard.
Pollard had a very good game. I thought Zulu would come on at 15 and Pollard say on.
In a close test like this was Pollard was needed. Those two missed penalties might have cost us.
Beeno
Sorry to differ from you - Pollard is not the player he used to be and he has pace problems as well, so I think ERasmus will keep him in the squad as Mentor and give him a few games against weaker opposition. He is not suiting to play the 15 man game the Springboks are endeavouring to acchieve, His game time will get mre and more limited as time goes on.
I think that since the Springboks cannot lose the RC trophy anymore I think that the Aregentine ests would eb excellent to blood new playes like Schickerling and Van eerden and give Etzebetha nd Du Toit well-earned rests and bri ng in Wilemse and give De Allende a rest as well. I woll also guve Kriel a res as wll and use Am at 13 - with Fassie at full back,
Hope Erasmus does that with younger players \brought into the team.
.
Pollard was fine. But the issue is a broader one. The starting team today averaged 30.5years. Surely one of the oldest international teams ever. And we are winning because of this experience, but in the next two years that advantage will become a disadvantage.
I think players like Pollard and Wille would be gone in two yeears time and also dummirs like Mostert. De Allende may remain aorund for twwo yers - but hsi replac,emt in thes tarting line-up would be the much younger Willemse.
SA have a much bigger pool of new players and tha is realized by all opposng teams. At least the NZ commentators believe that to be the case. .
Polly is yster!!!!!
I think what Rassie is doing right. Last week he gave the youngsters a crack against NZ to see if they can stand up and they did pretty well, but not good enough.
This week he brought on fresher players like Zulu and Hendrikse to close out the game.
I think there will be a lot of changes. However, don't forget that he took a losing team and turned them around in 18 months. Although, Pollard, Kriel, Dud etc already had close to 50 caps.
The real question, how many of these guys can he have in his team with 50 caps
We still have 6 test to go this year, so it is long from over