Proper Player Ratings….from the Telegraph

South Africa

15. Damian Willemse

All over the shop; it was nonsensical that he continued for so long with Le Roux waiting in the wings. Calamitous. 3/10

14. Kurt-Lee Arendse

Among the world’s best and, a touch of clumsiness aside, one of few shining lights despite his malfunctioning backline. 5/10

13. Jesse Kriel

He never touched the ball. Hardly to blame, with South Africa unable to use him effectively, but his impact was minuscule. 4/10

12. Damian de Allende

Like Kriel, De Allende struggled for involvement amid the aerial warfare, but was occasionally a physical beacon and grafted defensively. 5/10

11. Cheslin Kolbe

No one would have predicted May getting the better of the South African pocket-rocket - but that is how it went. 5/10

10. Manie Libbok

An accurate bomb led to the Springboks’ opening three points but from there it was quite tragic, proven by his first-half hooking. 4/10

9. Cobus Reinach

Again, no one would have predicted him as the inferior scrum-half on the night. But he was hassled by the English pack. 5/10

1. Steven Kitshoff

Replaced by Nche, being stripped by Itoje was the loosehead’s last act after Cole stood tall against his scrummaging might. 4/10

2. Mbongeni Mbonambi

The arrows faltered, his rabbiting got under O’Keeffe’s skin, and the gamble to ignore a bona fide replacement hooker looks somewhat foolish. 4/10

3. Frans Malherbe

The tighthead was there to scrummage but received precisely zero change from Marler and departed with his reputation tarnished. 4/10

4. Eben Eztebeth

The beating heart of the Springboks; harrying, harassing, hounding. Given his stature, the early replacement, with his team on the ropes, was staggering. 6/10

5. Franco Mostert

Topped the Springboks’ tackle count but was uncharacteristically dominated in the physical exchanges, particularly by the magnificent English tyro opposite. 5/10

6. Siya Kolisi (c)

Barely noticeable, eclipsed by the ubiquitous English back row. Two breakdown penalties in the first half nourished England’s belief. 4/10

7. Pieter-Steph Du Toit

The obstruction on May was his first major intervention, leading to a critical English three points, but the flanker’s engine is quite something. 5/10

8. Duane Vermeulen

Hammered by Daly in one of the match’s tone-setting moments and struggled to impose himself thereafter. Rattled by English aggression. 4/10

Replacements
Pollard’s early arrival steadied the ship, Nche’s scrummaging succour and Snyman’s dynamism emboldened South Africa for the match-winning finale. 8/10

Wow, someone who actually watches the game. How refreshing. I could only imagine the 10s and 9s on SA sites. 

Sensible comments from a reporter who reported according to the game and not his prior biases. Agree the subbing of Eben at that point was lunacy.

What we should also admit was Borthwick selected his best team and had a winning game plan. His only mistake was bringing on Sinkler and Genge when he did. Ten more minutes of the starters might have seen England home.

Erasmus by contrast had no game plan, did not anticipate the effect of Steward and never had his team ready for battle.

The Boks have been very reliant on getting the calls and fixing for handling errors on high balls. Erasmus has never had this team playing anything more yet they could be a genuinely tier 1 side, and one which dominates world rugby. Imagine if Mallett, Straeuli, Jake, or Meyer had the worst All Blacks and Wallabies of all time? With only Ireland and France showing something. We'd have been unbeatable. Saffers have long had an innate acceptance of mediocrity. It's worse now than ever. 

The worst AB and Wallabies teams since readmission and the best Bok talent pool. And yet we struggled against Scotland, Ireland (and lost), France and England.

 Every game is an arm wrestle because that’s all our coaches have faith in. Free up Kolbe and Arendse and we likely score tries. Instead we pick these small, elusive players and have them spend most of their productive time chasing high balls.

We don’t have a reserve hooker, we don’t play our best playmaker Esterhozen, but persist with Libbok who is a cat on a hot tin roof. And our captain is a total passenger who we survive for 45 minutes and then sub. So for half the game we have no ground game and for the whole game we have no forward runner who can break a tackle.

Heaven only knows what could be accomplished with sane coaching.

The same nutjob probably gives star rating to England but the Poms lost. 

The Boks scored the only try. Must again mean our defence was much better than it is being given credit for. Bwahahahahaha. 

Fake Bok supporters are very unhaply because we have made THE FINAL. All hopes of trashing Rassie are over. They are done. 

?so what went wrong for the Sprimboks narly losing the match.   

Problem 1

Like in the case against the French the Spingbok lost the lneeout battle.   The keu to that loss - that did not happen as badly against the F rench was te throw-ins that was poor and inaccurate.  Towards the end of the match the situation impoved wen Etzebeth was replaced by Snman 

The  Mozart Version of taditional SA Rugby  

The English had an advantage.   They never used their backline for attacking urposes and uised klickiing as a mans to enure lapses in the match and the Springboks tried to copy it with poor results.   The Springboks tried the same method - but poorly executed.   Never to uise the abckline for attacking  purposes - just kick the ball away,    Th difference was that English kickng game was btter executed and the SA version was poor.   The Ebg lish kicks were accurate and the recicipient ws under pressure through kick follow-ups.   The SA kicks were too fa ahead and ball catchers wsere not put under pressure,   - huge difference.   

The E0nglish never used their backline for attacking purposes,- neiiter did the Springboks unmtil the halfncks were replaced.    Af ter that th ere were some attacking moves wher the Springboks tp a l;imited extet started using their backline and it did result in improvement of the game by the Spriingboks and they put more pesure on the English defense.   

So the traditional SA game - aimless kicking by the Springbks was not working for the Springboks - but ws mrore effective when used by the English.

Scrumming and ball protection and recovery.     .  

In the 2019 final the Spring boks totally damaged the english scrumming - yesxterday thi were virtually no signs of domination by the Springboks.   Only in tjhe last 0 minutes of the gam the Springboks imrpoved and started dominating in scrums got some improvement in that regard rogress in that regard and the pringboks got a penalty that took them ver the.

Too often the Spring boks carried the abll into breakdiwn situastions and either lost possession and was penalized as a result.   In that regard all of Vermeulen, Kolsi and M ostert as to blame for that deficiency.   

Wrong  game plan poorly execied by the Springboks

In a way the match yesteday reminded me of the 2019 sedmi against the Welsh - the only difference being until nea to the end of the match in 2022 the Springboks was behind in poisntcoring - yesterday the English had a 9 point lead until the last 15 minutes of the game and lost that lead to a 2 point lead until the last 5 minutes of the match.   

Kick por kick and poorer kick was the cas yeserday and it nearly cost the Springboks the match.   Maybe it was not the game plan that was the problem - it was substandard implmentation that was a major problem.   In 2019 the De Allende try and conversion saved the Springboks - yesteday it was a micacle in teh alst few minutes of the game thats aved the Springboks from ecxiting the tournamne.   

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It’s much simpler than that….we played the same game we did against France, except amazingly the Poms anticipated that and selected a back three that could deal with the high ball. After that we had no plan B.