Dave I never raved about him....I complimented Taute on a few good performances. I do that. But seeing him at 13 he just doesn't have the guile to crack open test defences. He may be a candiadte at 15, but I haven't seen enough of him there in tight matches.
Dave let me try and explain my approach versus your approach. You celebrate any young player who comes along, meets your weight constraints and looks the part.
My approach starts with the observation that most of these guys fail....either in the S15 or test level. The real challenge is to identify those gems that are likely to make the breakthrough. So I look for knockout factors......Mvovo's lack of aggressive defence , which probably isn't coachable, Watson's lack of grunt and guts, Kirchner's lack of judgement, Olivier's lack of pace. One can see these things, and so can their opponents. At top level they can be exploited.
But there are gems. Fransie, Lambie, Bismarck.....and now perhaps Goosen, Marcel Coetzee, Kitshoff and Etzebeth. Players who have that something extra. These are the guys who interest me.....not the dog ordinary Flip Flops.
And once these guys are Boks and have proven they can contribute at the highest level.....like Jean, like Lambie, like Hougaard.....I want to stick with them. Rugby genius is hard to find.....it's mental, physical and has a lot to do with pure heart. Except for clear outliers it can't be devined by weight or performance in junior competition. It has to be clearly visible in the crucible.
