JON CARDINELLI of Keo chats to Professor Tim Noakes about the counter-productive South African system and why it will continue to cripple the Springboks in 2013.
Professor Tim Noakes paints a bleak picture. Many of the top South African players won’t be available for the 2013 Rugby Championship, as the number of fatigue-induced injuries is set to escalate in the coming year. The 2014 season, says the acclaimed sports scientist, will be even worse, and in the long term elite players will be forced to retire sooner than expected.
Noakes is patently frustrated with a system that prevents South Africa’s top players from peaking at international level, and at the southern hemisphere tournament that matters most. It’s a drum he’s been beating for years, and when the question is put to him for the umpteenth time, a verbal answer is evidently not good enough.
He places one hand behind his back, as if it’s tied.
‘This is how a South African player operates in today’s game,’ he says, with obvious concern.
The difference between the world champion All Blacks and the Springboks was highlighted before the final Test of the 2012 Rugby Championship. Ten months into the season, and the All Blacks still managed to field a full-strength team. By contrast, the injury-hit Boks were forced to make do with what was available at the time.
This called into question the way the game was run in South Africa, and if Saru could do better to centrally contract its top players as New Zealand has done for so many years. Bok coach Heyneke Meyer made the point in the build-up to that Test, that central contracting would see top players managed in the national interest rather than for the good of their respective provinces. It seemed as if Meyer and Noakes were on the same page (together with Beeno of course) when the Bok coach said that South Africans are at a disadvantage.
The question was put to Saru CEO Jurie Roux by SA Rugby magazine shortly after that tournament had concluded. ‘There is no scientific data to indicate the amount of games an elite rugby player should be playing in one year,’ Roux responded. He also reasoned that injuries in a high-speed collision sport were inevitable, and suggested that the franchises were doing an adequate job of managing their players. (What arrogance to not listen to a man Like Noakes - unbelievable really!)
But Noakes shakes his head when he is told of Roux’s assertion.
‘That is an unfortunate analysis,’ he says. ‘It’s like the tobacco industry telling you that there’s no scientific evidence that tobacco harms you, but that’s misleading, isn’t it?
‘Jurie is technically correct, because there’s been no study where we have systematically evaluated rugby players over 20 years and shown that after you’ve played a certain number of minutes, you are going to break down. It is, of course, not as simple as that, because there has never been the funding to do such a study.
‘I applaud Jurie and Saru for what they have done over the past few years, and for a BokSmart programme that has proved hugely successful, but hopefully Saru will come to realise that it’s important that we get an answer to this question pertaining to game time and injuries.’
For the past two years, the Sports Science Institute (SSI) has been collecting the relevant data. Working in collaboration with Saru, a SSI research team headed up by Dr Martin Schwellnus will now conduct a study in the coming Super Rugby competition, monitoring injuries and game time across the board. What will be missing, however, is the actual time in contact, how many contacts each player experiences while they’re on the field. This is information that cannot be monitored until the necessary funding is provided.
Nevertheless, Noakes hopes that the 2013 study will supply some sort of answer to a crucial question. He believes it may confirm what many suspect – that top players are conditioned to peak mid-year for their respective franchises rather than for the Boks in the Rugby Championship.
And having followed a few players closely over the course of their careers, he has already noticed a trend that may be related to burnout. At the moment, Noakes believes that 2,000 minutes of rugby during a season (25 games) is too much.
‘It may not sound that much, but you’ve also got to consider when exactly they play these games, and how much time they have, or don’t have, to recuperate,’ Noakes clarifies. ‘If those games are scattered over 11 months, then that’s no good. It’s got to be focused in a period of seven months. The ideal season, and this is how human beings function, would see two months of complete rest [an off-season], then a three-month pre-season, and then a seven-month season. If players did that, they would cut down injuries, and their careers would be longer.’
Noakes cites other sports where player management is considered a priority rather than an afterthought.
‘In Aussie rules they limit the amount of playing time. In Australian rugby [union], they have nine weeks off completely. I can tell you that the great athletes, the tri-athletes, once they do adopt the pattern of two months off, a three-month pre-season, and a seven-month season, they can go on for careers of 20 years. American football is the ultimate model, because it’s completely commercially driven, and they have a shorter season. They obviously get it right; everything is geared towards the players peaking at the right time, at the Super Bowl.’
Roux also told SA Rugby magazine last year that while the possibility of central contracting has already been discussed within the corridors of Saru, it is a proposal that may not be accepted by the players themselves. Form and money will come into consideration. A player in form will be reluctant to rest, because that form is not going to last forever. Some players would also lose money if they played fewer matches every year.
And yet, if one considers how much money a top player could potentially earn in an extended career that is not hampered by injuries, it seems a smart sacrifice to make.
‘The problem in South African rugby is that the player plays as hard as he can until he collapses,’ says Noakes. ‘The players are accountable, because they do overplay themselves; they’re addicted to the “Saturday Afternoon Syndrome” and like to be out there. And of course, there is the money. I’m not here to judge that, but is it the right attitude if you look at the bigger picture?
‘There are very few players who can make enough money during their careers to last them a lifetime, but most will be looking to set themselves up. Surely it makes more sense then to sit out a few games every year and perhaps give up R500,000 so that you can make much more in a lengthy career?’
In January 2010, Noakes was asked by then coach Peter de Villiers to explain the realistic dangers of burnout to a group of Springbok players. Noakes took each individual through the roadmap of their careers, through their game time and through their injuries, and showed them exactly where they tended to break down.
‘From that, I drew a conclusion,’ he says. ‘It’s not science, but a judgement call on how much each player could play. Typically in the first year as a Bok, they play about 500 minutes, the next year could be as much as 2,000, but in the following year it came down again because they got injured. I showed them this pattern and said, “maybe you should bring the amount of playing time down to about 1,600 or 1,800 minutes”, and then I predicted how much each should play in the following year.’
It was at this point where captain John Smit, who had sat angry and cross-armed throughout the presentation, interrupted.
‘It’s pointless talking to us, because we’re just doing a job,’ Smit said. ‘You’ve got to talk to the people who employ us.’
The year 2009 had been a golden one for South African rugby. The Bulls won the Super 14, the Boks went on to beat the British & Irish Lions, and subsequently claim the Tri-Nations crown. It was on the end-of-year tour to Europe, however, where fatigue caught up with them, and they lost Tests to France and Ireland, not to mention midweek games to Leicester and Saracens. It is something De Villiers himself made note of, and why he brought Noakes into the mix.
A few months later at that same presentation in Cape Town, Noakes confronted Smit and his charges about the issue.
‘I asked, “If you guys were so tired on that tour, why didn’t you admit it?” Eventually, one of the players said that the public would never accept it, and that making the excuse of fatigue was “not what Springboks do”. The players felt that would send the wrong message. Finally, another player stood up and admitted that he had been completely exhausted on that 2009 tour. So obviously it was an issue.’
(Yes the players know there are "fans" like rooitwit who would call it an excuse - oaks like this are not interested in the facts at all!)
Player management and the dangers of fatigue are issues that only ever come into focus when the Boks are losing. It is typically at the end of each season where Noakes is inundated with phone calls from journalists wanting to know if there is indeed a link between the high injury toll and the amount of rugby being played in a calendar year.
It is not a question that’s asked too often after a Bok victory, or even now, at the start of the rugby year. Indeed, many will wonder how the Boks still manage to perform relatively well and push top teams like the All Blacks if they are, as Noakes claims, at such a disadvantage.
Noakes has worked regularly with the Boks since Jake White brought him into the environment in 2007, and is thus well placed to provide an answer. Pride may be what stops players from admitting that they need to rest, but it is also pride that drives them to perform regardless of the threat of burnout.
‘South African rugby players are the best behaved players on the planet,’ says Noakes. ‘They are so disciplined, so committed, and there is a real culture of “we don’t complain”. That’s why it’s such a privilege to work with them and know them. They’re an astonishing group of young men, but unfortunately they get exploited by that.
‘Our players are 20% off where they should be,’ Noakes continues. ‘The only reason they perform as well as they do is because these guys are clever people, they’re helluva passionate and they’re wonderful athletes. They work hard and they want to be successful. Everything is against them, and yet, they can almost still do it! If we freed them and allowed them to really play to their potential, they’d klap the All Blacks. That’s the problem. That’s the frustration. I’ve always said to Saru, “Do you want the Boks to be the best in the world? If you do, then you need to make a change.”’ (HOOR HOOR AND HOOR away with this stupidity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Lets get ou ract togethe rand put thse wee abs in their rightful place as it used to be- its so obvious what needs to happen))
With Super Rugby having expanded to a 15-team competition, and the recently formed Rugby Championship having been pushed to start in August, Noakes believes that top players will be exhausted by the time that latter competition commences.
‘I think you can play 10 to 12 consecutive games before you’re buggered, and that is something that happens all too often in Super Rugby. It’s unfair to Heyneke and the Boks.
‘We saw it happen last year when New Zealand played South Africa in Soweto. It didn’t surprise me that New Zealand had all their top players available for that game. The point is that they don’t know anything that we don’t know, or that we couldn’t implement (HOOR HOOR AND HOOR!!!). We could do what they do, but the key is that the coaches buy in, and the central contracting allows them to rest players with the national interest in mind. As soon as a player shows signs of tiring, they must stop playing him.’
Unfortunately, with the current system still in place and the provinces holding more power than Saru itself, the respective franchises will continue to manage players as they see fit. This will again impact on the Boks’ performance and success. It is a system that needs to be changed, and sooner rather than later.
For according to Noakes, 2012 was just the start of a horror run of injuries. The nightmare will continue into 2013 and will only reach it’s nadir a year out from the 2015 World Cup.
‘The best time for injuries is usually after a World Cup year, because that’s when guys get their eight-week off-season and are granted the necessary rest. So 2012 was not as bad as 2013 will be – 2014 will be even worse. Fortunately, when 2015 comes along you can start to build a team again because most players will have been forced to have a break because of injury. That’s the irony, You almost want your players to be injured in 2014 so they can get the necessary break before the 2015 World Cup.”
Its really pathetic that we knw othe answer but ar just to daft to implement the solution. What Noakes didnt mention also is the departure on an increasing scale of player to the easier life in the NH which also pays better - young players like Roux, Stander, Louw, Kosteretc and now Elstadt. The future of our rugby is being stangled but the administrators are to blind to see it. Frankly we need a survival strategy!!!!!!!!!!!
