Our rugby depth

Injury and foreign based players included, we really do have depth to burn and there is no excuse for Meyer to achieve anything but great heights with this lot.

Lets start with a side of older players:

15. Kirchner 14. Habana 13. Jean 12. Frans 11. Aplon 10. Morne 9. Vermaak 1. Greyling 2. Bismark 3. Jannie 4. Flip 5. Bekker 6. Louw 7. Alberts 8. Spies

Now on to the youngsters:

15. Taute 14. JP 13. JJ 12. Serfontein 11. Rhule 10. Goosen 9. Hougaard 1. Beast 2. Strauss 3. Coenie 4. Etzebeth 5. Steph du Toit 6. Brussouw 7. Elstadt 8. Vermeulen

15. W.le Roux 14. v/d Heever 13. de Allende 12. Whitehead 11. Mapoe 10. Lambie 9. Reinach 1. Kitshoff 2. Chiliboy 3. Malherbe 4. de Jager 5. J.Marais 6. Kolisi 7. Coetzee 8. A.Botha

15. Visser 14. Jordaan 13. Swanepoel 12. F.Venter 11. Basson 10. Jantjies 9. Groom 1. Nkanyane 2. Cooper 3.M.v/d Merwe 4. Willemse 5. R.Botha 6. Daniel 7. Labascagne 8. CJ Stander

15. A.Coetzee 14. Mjekevu 13. Howard 12. R.Janse v/Rensburg 11. Sithole 10. Catrakillis 9. v/Zyl 1. Mellett 2. Fourie 3. F.Kirsten 4. Q.Roux 5. P.Marais 6. W.v/d Walt 7. D.Potgieter 8. v/d Walt

15. SP Marais 14. Helenberg 13. de Jongh 12. Ebersohn 11. S.Petersen 10. Pollard 9. Shraueder 1. Cayleb Oosthuizen 2. Ntumbeni 3. Herbst 4. Bresler 5. J.du Plessis 6. Stegman 7. Hattingh 8. Rhodes

15. U.Beyers 14. Fisher 13. Sadie 12. JP du Plessis 11. Senatla 10. Fouche 9. Duvenhage 1. Chadwick 2. Burden 3. Kemp 4. C.Wegner 5. Bulbring 6. Kriel 7. Armand 8. Carr

 Their is strong depth, especially in some positions. 

This is as individuals and  as a team.

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However, so do NewZealand. 

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Some of the weaknesses of SA rugby remain.

As a team our backline flyhalfs and centers do not have the distribution and running lines of our NZ counterparts. The "team" play capability of their players, helps to outperform our players.

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SA has more depth at loose forward "carriers", but NZ has more depth in the passing and playmaking game.

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Many of those ypung players make nice window dressing, but will never be international standard. Some will even struggle in the SuperXV. They are young and will be replaced by the next batch in 2014, 2015, etc etc.

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The game plan, and the personell who are capable to understand this, and can implement it will need to step up.

 I heard a bunch where going overseas this year Habana one of them, pieterson ect, Boks have a lot of brawn, there forward packs are great with awesome structure on defence, but what about attacking and you have to utilise your backs, NZ has a weakness in our back right in the guts threw injury, Conrad, and Nonu is pretty poor may be some experimenting going on there. Have to see how Boks combine up after SR. Hansen should name training squad next week.

Saffex

Their is great depth - but that would be of no interest - since Meyer is unlikely to make logical selections based on perrormance and shall come up with the same rubbish he did for the EOYT and his recent training squad.  What a disaster.

There are no prizes for third and beyond choices. Second choice teams do get in the mix eg in RWC years. But the history is, these young hopefuls get thrashed. The difference between our established team , and next best, is huge.

Mozart

I think what Saffex is driving at is that we must develop players and not stick to past heroes that has gone flat.  There are some very poor players in the Springbok set up at present that has grossly under-performed in Super 15 this year and those should be replaced asap.

I do not buy into the argument that once a Springbok - always a Springbok.   Since the 2007 WC and its immediate aftermath our rugby on international level has deteriorated constantly and there is even now a downeard trend in evidence.   Winning seven out of 12 tests and drawing two - the one against Argentina - indicates soe serious deficiencies and performances in even the tests we won were really unacceptable.

Then there is also the tendency of players to go and earn their pensions overseas and the selection of those players for the Springbok team is really not advisable.   Players are not up to standard physically anymore when they come back - since they have an aeasier regime where they go and play.   Some do not let themselves go - others do.  They really get fat and unfit and Meyer is stupid enough to select bench players from overseas and local franchises for the SA starting line-up.   You will argue about it - but players like Steenkamp and Van der Linde rarely if ever made the starting line-ups of their franchises and mostly play off the bench - but Meyer thinks they are good enough to represent the Country.   There are exceptions lie Louw  and Pienaar - but in other cases players like Francois Steyn, Grant and Kahue get back from Europe and Japan and immediately end up injured.

I think the situation is going to be equally bad with other players that are now leaving SA and that include Morene Steyn and Kirchner.   They are not irreplaceable and the objective should b to develop and select local players and forget about those who go overseas, reduce their fitness levels and then expect to be selected for the Springok team.  

Time for looking at our deficiencies properly and start to develop better players than we have had over the last three years.  The list is long and getting longer.  Every week we look at the Super 15 games and end up wondering why some players are even under consideration by Meyer.   Approximately half of his training group called up recently failed dismally week after week - but they are in like flint.  What is going on here?

 We (SA) have a lot of talented players but I agree with the uncle with the wig (Jy lyk soos Suzie September) - The gap between our best and second best is as big as the current gap between the Bulls and teh Kings.  What South Africa needs is a strategy to keep the excellent players in SA and we need a decent coaching staff - We need less interference from rugby officials/politicians who may be interested in their futures and not really the game, nê.

I will never say Meyer is not competent but he has too many restrictions and stupid little rules to work by.

How do we keep the p[layers?  Well, my bosses at the construction company gave us all shares and we share in the profit, so if we do not work well the profit is small and if we work hard and we are productive the profit is big, man we work like men possesed.  It works well for us and for the bosses - it can work for the Springbos too.

Moz at the moment if all players were fit and available our second string would be very strong. There is great talent but unfortunately we are behind in attacking play. However there are positive signs this is improving. What is also positive is that sides ar ehaving difficulty scoring against SA sides. nz netball rugby is struggling and only bent refs are keeping them from going down (Witness the debacle last week!!!)

You could defintely pick two strong test sides.

Realistically all one wants is real improvement year by year.  Meyer must build on his very creditable start last year. Unfortunately the draining away of players to the NH and Japan continue with no solution in sight.

How many more can we loose?

Munchers idea that we can join the NH would solve the financial problems but for the fact the seasons dont allow it . We cant play rugby here in mid summer.

Unless the cancer in our rucks, support play and skill sets are not inproved the next of the best youngsters wont reach any higher levels than what they have achieved now. truth be told the juniors will stil be stuck on development and not fine tuning there skills.

slow ruck speed...not proper opensiders in our unions and the lacks of attacking support play apart from the cheetahs this year will continue to destroy all the talent we have.

they are more defensive obsessed and they are not getting the balance right of attack as well. SA teams need to learn to play more up tempo rugby and make use of a open sider. the type of pattern that the cheetahs are playing this year and the type of game that the sharks played all of last year is the template of true springbok rugby.

talent is meaningless if not used correctly and developed correctly. the backline butchers like coetzee and meyer need to change there approach quickly. talent is there but backwords thinking coaches and medievil mentalities will only curb any development