Lambie too small?

Size comes in two aspects....height and weight. Pat Lambie is 5' 10" and supposedly weighs 202lbs. Maybe after eating a bag full of salted peanuts and drinking a gallon of beer. In any case at 202 lbs he passes most weight tests.....just.

However with our pal Heyneke, height is obviously a key consideration. Prizes to all who can work out why. And at just 5' 10" lambie barely looks down on the Sappster....in short he is a bit of a shortie, by modern standards.

Some have also called him a coward because he struggled with crucial kicks at goal, when a younger lad. That seems a little harsh, but still, it's true.....it's been said even on this site.

From my point of view Lambie is a brilliant young player, with the kind of all round game the Boks should be developing. After Fransie  Steyn was hurt he assumed the incumbent's mantle at the RWC, and played superbly......with guts, accuracy and vision. I would put him among the top 5 new players in the world game. Apparently our new coach disagrees.

Mozart

Don't give the girls on the Board a heart attack - they think Lambie is the real thing they love.   However, it may not be the issue here at all.   I think Meyer is making a huge mistake with kirchner and he would probably wake up too late to the fact that Kirchner and Pietersen combined are really the weak links in the back line.   Both are bad news- Kirchner cannot defend and has a major problem in catching of high balls under pressure, whilst Pietersen is probably the slowest wing in international rugby.

Another problem - Meisiekind - what is he doing on the bench?????????

He is hardly out of favour being on the bench

'He is hardly out of favour being on the bench"....you think not?

 There may just be a strategy with the impact the players on the bench can make.  I think HM will utilise the bench better than PdeV did - let's hope.  My concern is defense - with Tuilagi on 13 the Poms can use him as a battering ram and let Barritt slip past the two defenders neded to bring down the 13.  Else, they can use him as a decoy and let our defense cover him while we consentrate on him they slip past.  

No, would have been concerning if he did not make the match 22, more so the squad of 32. Thing is the Bok backline coach thinks Lambie is a better 10 than 15, so who knows what the thinking is here. Lambie might replace Morne in the game, Frans go to 15 and Olivier in at 12

 I don't think Patrick Lambie is to small at all. You don't have to be a big hulking player if you play at 10 or 15. Lambie is the exact same size of Dan Carter. Carter is 5'10 and only 2kg heavier than lambie. 

I think in the next two years Lambie can become as good as Carter, let him play 10, end of, stop wasting him at 15. He has all the mental attributes to be a great Flyhalf. 

His tackling technique is second to none and he isn't as stupid as Goosen who still needs to learn contact skills. Goosen must have been knocked out at least 6 times in the last 12 months. 

Where as Morne Steyn looks like a turn style when tackling, stand really deep in the pocket, hardly attack the advantage line and never makes a line break. 

This is his stats for this season

Steyns Stats

SEASON 2012 SNAPSHOT

1

Lambies Stats

SEASON 2012 SNAPSHOT

Lambie's size is not an issue here. Seems to me we have a very nice bench and Meyer plans to use it to win the test. One senses a plan here unlike in the past.

Note how he talks about the ball carrying abilty of Coenie and Strauss. Man once those forwards start to drive over the advantage line and the ball is whipped out to the backs a try bekons. Fowards driving the ball over the advantage line are vital to success. Something the greatest lock ever could never do. He went backwards even against backline players- bwahahahahahahahahaha hilarious when you think about it.

No folk now begins a great push to make the Boks the top dogs again. This is not the finished product but  a begining is being  made.

it is about size Hasbeen .....your attacks on Matfield are based on size. Dave's attacks on Pietersen, Aplon and de Jongh are based on size.

That's why the two of you are as happy as pigs in it.

I just hope you are as happy on Saturday and Dave can also rationalize his call for a Bok loss.

Moz dont you get it that small guys are not playing test rugby at wing, centre or fullback these days, its a given. We just dont see the Aplon type of player anymore. We certainly dont see a de Jongh at 13. Hell Tuilagi at 13 for the Poms on Sat is 110kg and Jean is 102kg's.

Watch the test matches this weekend and you will not see a single player under 90kg's at wing, fullback or centre bar Halfpenny of Wales, who himself has bulked up to a bodybuilders physique - something poor poohie was unable to comprehend or take on board.

There is a reason these little guys are overlooked. Defences are so well structured and tight at test level these days that players have to commit to taking contact, drive through the player and offload. Same in defence, yes these little guys technically are great in low open field tackles but much of todays defence requires the defender to envelope and drive the attacker backwards. These little guys cant do this

It's a tradeoff Dave. You see your man JJ at 13 on Saturday. Kolisi drifts beautifully on the pass and beats him through the outside gap......try and match. Would de Jongh have missed that tackle? Never in a year of Saturdays.

So you look for balance. We have a unique type of player in RSA....the small strong man. Aplon is one of those, de Jongh too and the brilliant Breyton Paulse. Nobody else has these kinds of players, or very few of them. That's why you don't see them.

If we give up on this unique advantage and choose only plodders, we will be second to NZ who has bigger and faster players. Our alternative is to sprinkle in a few fast elusive guys who can exploit their ponderous size. Not a team of them....one or two. I'd have Aplon on the bench rather than Olivier any day.

Oh give it a break Moz, do you honestly think that because of that Kolisi try, JJ is now suddenly a carthorse. Are you saying de Jongh has never missed a tackle?

Sorry Moz you see these players as special, de Jongh is anything but. There is nothing special about this guy, if he was special we would have seen it all S15 with him ripping defences apart etc. No he is not special, not even close.

Aplon is better than de Jongh, but lets face it what has he done of note at test level and if it was something it was some time back.

The notion that players like Taute, JJ, Jordaan and co are plodders is nonsense, these guys match the pace of their opposite numbers are no different to the likes of Jean, Frans and Fourie in terms of speed, in fact Jordaan and JJ are quicker than any of these 3.

Nope I am with Meyer here, there is no way in hell I would play de Jongh at 13, there is no way he would sustain a test level performance at that size. He would be completely blown away and targeted. What has he done at test level or this S15 that is worthy of the faith you have in him? I dont get it at all

I'm confident this plodder approach is going to crash and burn.

Moz so are you saying that defences will become less structured, thereby affording more space leading to the return of smaller players able to dance their way around defenders?

I somehow doubt it, if anything players will just get bigger and stronger. The ultimate player in modern test rugby is the large skilled guy......plodders do not come into the equation. You dont need to be small to be skilled.

I'm saying we don't have one back, Fransie included, with the power of  a Maa Nonu. We will always be outcompeted if we try and 'me too' the ABs. When we had them was in 2004 and 2005 where the speed of Habana made all the difference....we had a weapon they couldn't mtach. If we outcompete them in the backline, it will be with speed not brawn.

Disagree Moz, Frans is easily on a par with Nonu strength wise......with the likes of JP being up there. But agreed, the South Sea Island lads are generally bigger but they tend to lack the real hard edge, which accounts for our slightly smaller guys being able to compete.

But Nonu aside, how many of these really big backs have made it at test level in NZ? Like Tuilagi of England, you will find this kid is rediculously big, I could not believe his size seeing him in the felsh a few weeks ago, but a few hard wacks and he goes awol, he never featured in that match. But if he turns up on the day, he is a real handful.

Defences are going to get tighter and tighter, modern tech will pave the way for this. The only way to breach will be through raw power as a the primary weapon followed by skill as the secondary. SBW has paved the way, players to follow will perfect it. You have to commit physically and offload effectively is the way forward 

Lambie has never been too small, rather a coward. He hesitates the make decisions and likes to hide away when the going gets tough. I recall my video exposé on him in last years TNs against Australia; in it he flopped terribly and even allowed attackers to run mere mm past him. He put his backline under immense pressure. As a fullback he is a better player, by pure virtue of the fact that he is exclusively a fullback. He is still very nervy, as seen in the Fijian game, though he did have a good game in the QF even though he blew the timing on his run for the try. In short, Lambie is a poor decision maker in any position. He is touted as having flair, but has shown none. He offers us no advantage over any top test side. Look to Joe Pietersen for a look at a real quality fullback, a complete fullback. A courageous player who has the guts to hand-off the entire shark's front one in succession and slink his way past three would be defenders. That's world class. Bumbling around making zero impact is not the mark of greatness. Lambie makes Pienaar look as courageous as Frans.

Der Aristokrat

Glad to see you back - its nice to debate things with you.   I assume your quietness may be the result of the Blue/Pink  Bulls loss on Saturday - but that is really ansty of me to think like that.   Lets get this straight once and for all.   Lambie is twice the flyhalf Morne Steyn would ever be.   Steyn is the best goal kicker after Naas Botha I have ever seen - but he has a real problem.   He is definitely a player with virtually no ball skills - so lets get everything in real perspective.  

You must be the only Board member that rates Steyn above Lambie as a flyhalf.   Your comments are somewhat vague - since you apparently base it entirely on the one incident you mentioned in your comments.   This is not entirely fair to the said player - every player - even the greatest players I have seen once in a while makes a mistake in a game.   In some cases it takes a while for the memory to disappear - I grant you that.    Insofar as Steyn is concerned I believe - and stats prove it over and over again - that he in fact  is a poor defender at flyhalf - proven time and time again.   His kicking game often is unrelaiable and his passing game very poor.   He is in the team because of his goal kick ability - nothing else.

Really surprised about your comments on Joe Pretorius.   i have to agree whole-heartedly on that one. 

No Card, Lambie is defintely no coward. I have seen him successfully bring down big players. He has a cool head and good judgement. All this has been widely recognised.  Fine young player.

Sorry but cant agree with this.

 Lambie is no coward - please!  Where does this stupid subjective notion eminate from?  If that is the case, please support that with fact, stats and video links.

der you do come up with the biggest load of bullshit when it comes to Lambie, I did not bother reading past the first sentence as you are clearly delusional when it comes to certain players - not worth the debate

Morné is no poor defender. He dealt with the Samoans well enough and regularly brings down forwards. One key difference is that Morné will chase down everything even remotely with his vicinity. Lambie does not. What I point out are not isolated incidents either, but common occurances. In fact, Lambie has been regressing as a player for some time. Not too dissimilar to Pienaar in that he burst onto the scene with energy and purpose, now he is just average and not even able to better a Frenchman who was past his best six years ago. You say Lambie is a thousand times the player Morné is, please explain. Lambie is a very frail player in contact, particularly at 10 where he gets dragged around like Adi Jacobs; something New Zealand heavily exploited last year in their record win over us! Morné is the best distributor we have right now, the best decision maker and the only 10, aside from Goosen, who has the sense to vary his game appropriately. Lambie remains no better than Earl Rose at 10. At 15 he is well down the pecking order.

Moz consider Jake's 2007 WC team. The pack was over 920 kg. bigges tpack in the comp. Os 127 kg, smit 116 kg, CJ 125kg, Bakkies 120 kg, wee matfield 107 kg, Burger 110 kg Rossouw 118 kg and Juan smith 107 kg

The backs were big too,  Du Preez 90 kg, Butch 96 kg Frans 105 kg, Jaque Fourie 100 kg. JP 96 kg habana 90 kg and Montgomery 90 kg or so. These were roughly the weights. Now were are more than 4 years hence and the guys are not getting smaller.

Jake tossed out the small guys who were getting crunched. He and Eddie knew what they were doing as do all these other coaches today. BUT one has to keep an open mind and fairly evaluate what a small guy offers. There should be no outright dismissal just because a guy is small if he is in fact doing the job.

Of course we can match the big Islander backs but one goes generally for biger guys to do it with a small guy being the exception that proves the rule.

Take Jakes example on this and the example of other coaches. Big backs can be fast and skillfull - a good big un will normally beat a good small un. A brilliant small un may beat a good big un - its possible.

Lastly I did say I would prefer Joe to Kirchner. And you did say you would not play all three  - Aplon, Joe and de jong - together in a test thereby admitting being small has risks etc.

 Beeno1, the case for big or small backs refers.  How big were our backs in 1995?  How big was Jona and how many tries did he score against SA in 1995 >> I seem to recall Nada, Nothing, Niks.  It does not always work - if you have a decent coach with a decent plan to counter the big uys they suffer against the smaller but more agile guys.

Now, I am not saying get rid of all the big guys, just that there are places for small guys as well.

Der Aristokrat

I have to differ from you on Steyn.   He has no ball sense - that one.    His only asset is goal kicking - his passing game is poor since he stands back too far  to serve as a passer and he passed the ball often in the form of hospital passes - and the players then get caught behind the advantage line.   It is a known fact that opposition teams have identified Steyn's problems on defence - they often use the strategy of attack in the channel because of their assessment that Steyn is a poor defender.   It is a known fact that Steyn would never play at flyhalf in most countries because of the listed deficiencies - his only claim to fame is goal kicking and the rare cases of drop kicks.     There are better flyhalfs around without his shortcomings and penalty and try conversions cannot nowadays be the basis for selection - end of story. 

Mike, I have completely debunked this myth long ago. Morne and Goosen are the ONLY 10s in SA that wont pass for the sake of it. Please stop embarrassing yourself.

Der Aristokrat

I am not embarrassing myself by my comments - lets wait and see what happens on Saturday - OK?

Lunatic I am only will to concede that a player must be evaluated on merit. If a small guy is better than the big guy he gets it. That said it has to be very obvious that the big guys are winning hands down no matter what leading rugby nation is considered. All coaches are seldom picking the small guys because of the simple case that in the large majority of cases the bigger guys perform better.

Also takew a look a these young players coming through - only Goosen is fractionally below 90kg. All these players will get heavier and even Goosen will probably be about 94 kg in a season or two,

Whitehead 95 kg, Taute 95 kg, Jordaan 94 kg, JJ 95 kg, Sadie 93 kg, Goosen 88 kg, Hougard 92 kg, Lambie 92 kg, Sithole 91 kg Poolman 99 kg and van der Heever 101 kg.  These represent minimum weights for them as they will no doubt be heavier in future.

Now I ask you with tears in my eyes where are all these small wizards folk are speaking of. They dont exist in the future. Backs under 90 kg will utimately disappear. Backs under 100 kg will in future be considered small - that is the trend Lunatic. Meyer and Jake white understood this.

BUT lets be opened minded and evaluate fairly. Some freak of nature will be the exception proving the rul and must be picked.

 .

Lambie as a 10 is nothing special and I really don't get what the hype is all about....regardless of his size. At 15 he has impressed, but I have'nt seen enough of him there to confirm weather or not he is the next Percy.

 No contest, he is better than Percy

Come on, get real. Lambie is certainly no coward...on the contrary got more guts as a youngster than most players who have been around the block a few times, on top of that he is a calm character with exceptional ball skills and outstanding character with true leadership abilities. Certainly not too small...same height as DC and taller than some past heroes...Chester Williams was short and so was the legend Mannetjies Roux...besides what has height got to do with a fullback or flyhalf...he is not a line-out forward. Weight is perfect...give the man a chance as he is so young...he is very strong physically and don't get fooled by his angel face...he is tough. In later years he will bulk up.

This lad is a future star in the making...just you wait and see. Patrick will never let the side down...obviously HM has confidence in him and so do all his team mates.

I never seem to be short of astounded when I read what fans write. Lambie has leadership skills? Where have we ever seen those? Do you all just plastered the net with the first thing that comes to mind? If Lambie is so courageous, then why does he flounder under pressure? Why so erratic? Why can't he make a dominant tackle? He is not tough mentally or physically. To suggest otherwise is ridiculous. Lambie is and always will be nervy and indecisive. He will let the side down just as he always has done.

Oh, and bright spark, a short fullback will be peppered with high balls, and against tall opposition, he will lose. A tactical flaw - think of those Argentinians who are highly adept at targetting any flaw with a variety of aerial assaults. Lambie is ordinary, certainly he has become so. What could have been, a fullback when it was all too obvious that he was no 10, has now since passed and is something we will only ever be able to speculate on.