Sprigboks - Pumas Game

I was the one person who thought that it might be a tight game - but I was wrong. There were things that could have gone wrong - but in the main it did not - so all SA fans should be happy. In the first half there were still too much aimless kicking by Steyn and Pienaar - which resulted in difficulties in getting the backline performing. However, once that stopped the whole pattern o0f the game changed - Du Preez was in fact a vast improvement on Pienaar - but I do not think he will be available throughtout the series and that remains a problem. Le Roux was brilliant and totally unpredictable - which is what made attacking backline play a real threat to the opposition. There is no problem with he center combination at all. In a team of good performances there were some false notes though - or rather let me say there were some players who was not in zinc with the rest of the players. Those include Basson, Alberts and Kruger. They were not unsatisfactory - but not really top notch. * Basson was largely invisible and I cannot remember him doing anything much during the whole game. * Alberts started off badly - knocking on the first ball passed to him and missing his first tackle. Thereafter he carried the ball on four occasions - but did not gain much territory (about 2 meters per carry). He did score a try - but that stemmed from a maul situation - where anybody at the back with the ball in his possession would have scored. His tackle count was low and the short while Kolisi was on the field he showed much more than Alberts did in the whole game. * Kruger's line out jumping was satisfactory - but for other aspects of -play he was invisible - nothing much to wrote home about. There was not too many loose balls on the field that the opposition could benefit from. One involved Morne Steyn - for the rest there was very few mistakes the opposition could turn into points - something the All Blacks and the Wallabies thrive upon. That is a very positive sign. My MOM would be Le Roux - the player that made a massive change to the side since he was selected intitially - and that change continued today. On the whole I still think the backline would improve by playing Engelbrecht at 14, De Villiers at 13 and Serfontein at 12. Main reason - I do not believe Basson is good enough on the wing and Serfontein when he came on - was brilliant. To my mind he should start at 12 in the next test. .