Alright, leaving all the blatant irrelevancies aside, this is what I managed to magic up in a couple hours:
1) In modern Rugby, kick-offs have become just as important – if not more – than traditional set pieces. And the Boks are excellent when it comes to applying pressure on their rivals come kick-off time. They make good use of Morné Steyn’s cannon-like boot and the speed and mobility of some of their players.
Under Meyer’s tenure, the main kick off chasers are Bjorn Basson and Juandre Kruger, both highly mobile and good in the air.
Against Scotland and Italy, they managed to exert extreme pressure on the opposite receivers:
Here Kruger almost managed to regain possession.
Here Basson regained possession and almost scored a try. Both situations ended up with lineouts in extreme defense.
2) The Rolling Maul. A traditional strength of South African teams, under Johan van Graan’s tutelage, the Boks have polished certain technical aspects of their mauling game. The “frontmen” spend quite some energy trying to work their way into the weak angles of their opposites, while the second line focuses mainly on pushing forward. The key for the defending teams here will be to exert pressure from both sides, so as to erode the frontmen’s leverage. Work hard to force them to stand up, or alternate the intensity so as to keep them off balance. Usually the Boks manage to “peel off” their opposite frontmen at maul time, thus leaving the second line with a change to push unopposed into the tryline. This is achieved by a constant alternation of angles and pushing techniques (the main operators here are the frontrowers).
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Here the Scot player comes in laterally, forcing a penalty try.
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The ball carriers are invariably Adrian Strauss or Francois Louw (used to be Bismarck du Plessis and Heinrich Brussöw years ago). Both are quite mobile and often break out for a quick pushing pod, or to meet up with another ball carrier running an inward angle (mainly Willem Alberts or Jean de Villiers). From there they recycle with “truck and trailer” pods, until there is a blatant numeric advantage outwide.
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3) Line-outs: Often another critical weapon in the Bok arsenal, under Meyer’s tenure the Boks have developed a simple, yet effective pattern than worked against their opponents. For this all they need was a second playmaker in the team, namedly the talented Willie le Roux.
Clean line-out ball, Pienaar throws a flat pass to the entire Bok backrow:
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The variations here are scarce, however with carriers like Louw, Coetzee, Kolisi, Alberts et all running hard at the gainline, it is pretty effective.
A variation of the set move features a pivot mixed up among the aforementioned pod, namedly Jean de Villiers. Here Pienaar can skip pass to JDV, or pass to one of the loosies, who in turn will pop back a pass for JDV, who will either run a different angle ball in hand, or pass to his outside man. The key to dismantling the dynamic of this movement is to effect a dual defensive pattern, a good mixture of rush defense and drift defense.
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Now, if the first pod manages to make good yards, the ball is quickly cleaned out and taken back into the very side the lineout was executed from (catching the defensive line off guard). Here is where the electric talent of le Roux comes into play. The Boks send out a dummy forward pod (usually consisting of 3 players), and Pienaar launches le Roux into the line, running hard. His speed and distribution have the potential to generate plenty of space for his outside backs.
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4) Set piece first phase gainline ascendency: Critical in modern Rugby. Here the Boks have plenty of first phase ball carriers in the backs: JDV, JJ Engelbrecht, Jan Serfontein, and maybe even Habana.
The number of variations in this first phase are bound to at least make the defenders stand flat on their heels, which greatly reduces their ability to react, and even execute aggressive tackles. The Boks of 2009 loved to send out a big carrier upfront just to skip pass the ball into Habana, who would then run unopposed to the tryline. The Wallabies often executed the very same move with Digby Ioane and Pat McCabe.
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The key to defending such a situation is down to communication. The All Blacks excel at this, often having the defenders shout out the number of the man they will be marking one on one. The Samoans here executed a good rush defense but failed to communicate with each other.
5) Box-kicking: Absolutely KEY aspect in the Bok gameplan. This is why I believe Ruan Pienaar must be the starting 9 in every game. His kicking game can be deadly. He must focus on executing contestable box kicks, taking advantage of the technical prowess of certain Bok wingers (Habana, Basson, Ndungane), combined with the mobility of their forwards (Oosthuizen, Strauss, Mtawarira, etc). Failure to execute contestable kicks might turn out to be horribly counterproductive against natural counter-attackers like Folau, Dagg, Smith, Savea, Barrett, etc.
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Box kicking creates panic among defenders. They will often neglect their defensive pattern and rush back to regain possession and / or secure the ball. If the Boks manage to get the ball back, they will quickly ship it wide where guys like le Roux, Basson, Habana, JJ and such can break havoc. The Samoans suffered the exquisite execution of this pattern on several occasions.
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Overall, the Bok gameplan is quite simple in its conception. It does rely on the technical executions of certain key players (Strauss, Louw, Pienaar and JDV). These are players I believe cannot miss a game.
While the execution against Samoa was outstanding during extensive periods of the game, I doubt the Boks will be allowed to rack up their moves so freely against Argentina, NZ, and Australia. For example, I think Pienaar will have a VERY hard time distributing the ball against Argentina and NZ, both teams known for their breakdown prowess. Players like Mtawarira, du Plessis and Etzebeth will have to put up a hand to get heavily involved in the tight.
Another interesting aspect is the Boks centre pairing. JDV is in great form and has traditionally proved to be a very sound defender, but JJ Engelbrecht is a different story. He does have a good tackling technique, and he did defend well against Italy, Scotland and Samoa – however – his defensive nous will be heavily tested by the likes of Ma’a Nonu, Conrad & Ben Smith, Julian Savea, Adam Ashley Cooper, etc. I noticed he is still trying to master his pre-tackle biomechanics, which results on him missing some otherwise easy tackles. The same goes for Willie le Roux.
As for the flyhalf issue – I’d stick with M. Steyn for now. The inclusion of le Roux gives the Boks a different attacking prowess. He runs hard, times well his passes, and often lures in defenders before putting his team mates into space. This is exactly what the Boks need in channel 2, given JDV’s slight distribution deficiencies.
One player I am not happy about is Willem Alberts. True, he is a devastating carrier, and puts in some bone-jarring tackles. But his general skillset is poor compared to guys like Louw, Kolisi or Coetzee. His predictability in open play was horribly exposed by Argentina in Mendoza.
I’d much rather have somebody else like Lappies Labuschagne, whose immense workrate and lineout prowess would really aid the Boks gameplan. In reality, there are plenty of other guys I’d love to see in the Bok loose trio set up, if a proper rotation policy were to be embraced.
As for my Bok 22, well – it’d be vastly different to what Meyer would select, but that’s because I would embrace a different gameplan. My Bok 22 (provided everyone was injury-free) would feature players like Pieter-Steph du Toit, Deon Fourie, Lappies Labuschagne, Duane Vermeulen, Piet van Zyl, Johan Goosen, Jan Serfontein, Paul Jordaan, etc.
I hope the analysis came out half-decent in your view. I did not have as much time as I would have wanted, but I will try to be much more extensive in my analysis of the All Blacks and Wallabies.
Later guys!