Test success stories show early..... Test failures never recover

I often read 'in form centre Wynand Olivier" these days.  Call me paranoid but this seems to presage another call for his inclusion at 12 for the Boks. This would be a mistake. Matt Giteau kindly showed us exactly why Wynand can't play at test level, he simply doesn't have the acceleration to cover fast centres.  The Qualude showed this again last year....running right round the planted Wynand. He wont get faster.

And speaking about the Qualude, deep in his brain there is a fear of failure. Put him in a tight test this fear will incapacitate him. He may play some stunning games at test level, but put him in that close one that counts, and he will flop.

Almost every test success shows their mettle immediately......Brussouw, Schalk, Jean, Habana, Lambie, Frans, Victor.....they were young and immediately showed they belonged.

Now look at the guys who flopped.....Nokwe, Gaffie, Olivier, Pienaar at 10, Flip, Geo Cronje etc....they were bad in their first games and never got better.

I almost can't find a player who looked like a flop in their first test, and came back. That's because fatal flaws in mental strength and physical attributes don't change. Loosies, hookers, locks, scrummies, centres and wings all debut at close to their long term best. They get better for sure, but not enough to transition from test failure to test success.

I think it's possible that fullbacks, flyhalves and props may be exceptions, because those positions have so much to learn in the transition to test rugby. But I can still only think of one example who seemed doomed to failure and came back.....and that's Jannie du Plessis, who had some rough early tests. Even Monty who recovered his form late, was a brilliant success in his early tests.

So I think you can forget about mentoring Spies....he is a robot somewhere in his brain. Likewise Mvovo wont learn how to play against the better TN wings.....Kirsten wont become a reliable fullback...oh.... and Wynand will never succeed in tests.

 Confession, I am new and cannot spell so help me understand:

"And speaking about the Qualude"  Who is this?

"Kirsten wont become a reliable fullback...oh.." Who does this Kirsten play fullback for?

I'd consider helping you, but you have a preposition at the end of your sentence....work on it, and ask again.

 What he fuck's wrong with you?  I see many errors on the forum and do not bitch about it - you are just plain fucking dumb by the looks of it.  answer the fucking questions like a decent forumite.  Little wise-ass snotnosed dead muzo.  Like the look of your keyboard art?  Dumb, fucking dumb.

Allow me to assist - Quade Cooper is the qualude I think and kirsten is Kirchner?

Allow me to assist - Quade Cooper is the qualude I think and kirsten is Kirchner?

LOL and you would think an opinionated mortal like that would not make any mistakes seeing as he is so quick to pounce on others - Thanks Beeno1 - at least there are two of us that cannot spell for shit but know something about rugby.

 Well Moz for a start Pienaar never failed at 10, just go check his MOM preformance against England for confirmation of this. He is a better 10 than Morne and like Lambie could have made a career out of playing 10. The only spot Pienaar looked lost in was at 15.

Flip has only played a handful of test and has been far better than pretenders like Johan Muller or the pathetic call of Jakes bringing Ackerman back. Geo Cronje had all of 2 or 3 tests and by all accounts was solid and would have probably made a good fist of test rugby.

As for Olivier, he was always good enough to play test rugby, but rightly lived in the shadow of Jean. He never had an extended run at 12, hence never settling. He has never let the Boks down at 12, far, far better centre than jokes like Adi or Bosman. But no way can we play him now, he like Jean have had their best days.

Our inside centre options are Frans and Whitehead - look no further

Dave none of your current failures like Olivier, Flip, Spies, Strauss, .....JP at 13, or Pienaar at 10 will do anything of merit in test rugby. Just like your past failures like Murrray, Deysel etc. Failures remain failures and you sure know how to pick 'em.

Lunaprick I have told you before....be friendly and I will respond in similar vein. Remain a prick and don't expect me to be nice. But keep your cool, ranting is a tell.

 Moz if Morne in the eyes of some can make it at test level then calls like JP not making it as a 13 is a poor call, given firstly that he has not played 13 at test level, has played a handful of games at 13 for the Sharks where his coach called him the best 13 in SA a few weeks back and you want to tell me he is a failure? 

That just does not add up.

Flip has been good at test level, the best 4 we have had after Bakkies.

I have never called for Murray as our test 13, have only ever called for him as the back-up to Fourie. Certainly a better bet than good old Adi.

You have me confused with someone else on Deysel. Good solid player but down the test pecking order in my books and has always been down that list. 

Pienaar has already done something of merit at 10 in test rugby, he was MOM against England. Pienaar is a far more talented rugby player than Morne and would have made a better 10 than Morne if he had not been messed around as much as he was

 Pienaar isn't good. Like his father

 What crap, Ruan is far better than his dad was

 I will agree with the fundamental premise- that most test players shine after a few tests at least. Rare is it that it takes 20 odd tests to play at Bok Level. 

Also that Missie Kind- has more than enough chances. I have seen him play well for the Bulls, but only has donky blinkers on - crash ball- at bok level. 

However Pienaar played well in just about all positions during the Jake White Era. He just did not understand the game plan of PDV or lack thereoff. He was frustrated with following no game plan. 

Knokwe- should never have been on the field and struggled to impose himself at Super xv level.

Wynand falied under the last 2 coaches- even then one that had a plan. So no- we cant consider him as a bok.

The only exception- is having Roedolf Strauli as coach or , being in a whole new team with PDV coaching. Remember the tour when Earl Rose and co, played for the b-team and we lost all of the mid week games. Not that Earl Rose was not allready a failure before he became a bok- bad example"

RE: Test success stories show early..... Test failures never recover
May 07, 2012, 22:05:42

 Lunaprick I have told you before....be friendly and I will respond in similar vein. Remain a prick anddon't expect me to be nice. But keep your cool, ranting is a tell.

It is quite obvious that you suffer from a phobia of some kind.  Continuously changing names with a sexual connotation and calling posters pricks is tantamount of some idiot who suffers from small-dick-syndrome.  Having a nic affiliated to a dead muzo seems to indicate a spot of necrophilia as well.  The responses were all turned into attack in a vain effort to hide the fact that you make silly mistakes with players’ names as well, indicating your lack of attention to detail when you post.

Your inability to respond in a civil manner has been noted and your obvious disabilities have touched my heart – now fuckoff and go bother someone else with your “clever” shit. I will not respond to your drivel in any way shape or form again as I have note the inability to communicate from your side, made even more difficult by the admiration you have for your mirror image.  Bye, bye dead muzo because for me you are now dead.

Hey lunatic lighten up boet. I have been posting for over a decade with Moz and I can assure you he is both  an outstanding poster and great guy.

My advice is just enjoy the repartee and dont take offence. My example with ou windpomp is an excellent one! Hahahahhahahaha. Saint Beeno in action in fact. Who else would put up with all his hot air like I do!!

Hey lunatic lighten up boet. I have been posting for over a decade with Moz and I can assure you he is both  an outstanding poster and great guy.  (Your judgement may be yours, I have a different opinion and experience)

My advice is just enjoy the repartee and dont take offence. ( Repartee?  More like derision - trying to hide his own flaws by calling me names...LOL)  My example with ou windpomp is an excellent one! Hahahahhahahaha. Saint Beeno in action in fact. Who else would put up with all his hot air like I do!!  (Hot air indeed - dead muzo is all hot air)

Lunaprick, if it's all the same to you, I'm not going to bother engaging your earnest outrage.....ennui has just set in, big time.

These are The Days of Our Forum......

My two cents is, lets keep the discussion on rugby. The name calling and personal stuff is a waste of time.

Well reffed there bluebok lets hope lunatic and Moz become good friends! Hahahhahahahahaha

I must correct a few incorrect assumptions here. Quite right though that test flops almost never recover, but the list needs to be rejigged.

I had reviewed the 2007 away leg to New Zealand. I had mercifully almost forgotten that it was the du Plessis brother's debut for the Boks. Bismarck had a howler, really let the side down throughout with errant and erratic play that has become his hallmark. Jannie was struggling in the scrums. Aside from that we acquitted ourselves well.

Lambie's debut was on the 2010 EOYT. One I had reviewed over December with the exception of the England test. Lambie was dreadful in every second he played. Yes, many were beguiled by his penchant for running aimlessly and frantically. He single-handedly nearly lost us the Irish test after completely dominating them in every facet of play with Morne on. Lambie would continue his poor form in every other test at 10, and looked merely at home at 15 without every truly looking world class.

Jean excelled on the wing to a degree. He is after all a natural wing and never a natural centre. Though he never did have the speed needed for a real quality test wing (As seen when he was swiftly chased down later in the 2004 TNs by Wallaby lock out wide). I noted over the review of the 2004 TNs how much we lost with the loss of Barry. Undoudtedly 2005 was a stretch too far for him, but he was sublime in 2004. He broke the line with ferocity, his work at the breakdown was monstrous, he varied his play well with clever chips and grubbers that genuinely troubled the defence. His distribution, particularly his offloading, was of the highest order. He had an awareness that Jean never has had at 12. He played a big part in our highly attacking game of the 2004 season. Jean offered stability in much the same way as Olivier does, only he seemed adept at intercepting ball. Something which reflected his natural instincts as a wing. With Barry gone we reverted to a much more defensive game in 2005. Much of that had to do with Jean. Something which never recovered, not even once, until present day. The 2006 EOYT was another key example. Jean cleaned up a loose ball and darted for the try line, he had Akona and Cronje inside of him screaming for the ball. All he had to do was draw his man and pass and it was a guaranteed try, and a crucial one too. He however ended up driven into touch. Even Guscott remarked, "That right there is the difference between a good centre and a great centre. A great centre would have had the awareness to put his an away". How true it all was. Olivier may never be a great test centre, but neither has Jean been. 

List of flops: Eddie Andrews ~ Jean De Villiers ~ Adi Jacobs ~ Nokwe ~ Olivier ~ Bekker ~ Krige ~ almost all of our props of the last thirteen years ~ Bismarck ~ Lobberts ~ Jantjes ~ Lambie ~ Jantjies ~ Kankowski ~ Rose ~ Newman... the list goes on and on

List of clear successes: Fourie (top SA try scorer in TNs) ~ Frans ~ Habana ~ JPP ~ Morne ~ Jaco van der Westhyzen (15)

I noted your remarks on mental strength Moz. Very true. An it's here that Lambie is particularly undone. He is very brittle, much more so that Pienaar ever was. He has n conviction in anything that he does. The best test players have bite to their play, they are full of life and energy. Watching Lambie play is like drinking a cold cup of coffee in winter. Passive and with a lack of thought. Pienaar has instincts for the game. And even at 10 he had many very successful games, which were only let down twice for fragility under pressure in scoring place kicks. You forget how he dominated on the EOYT of 2008 and the first Lions test. Or his successful S14 campaign at 10. Lambie has never been able to do that.

Now onto Bismarck. He is very sure of himself, and as he is from the Freestate I wanted him to succeed. However a lack of BMT and composure has severely curtailed what could have been a very successful test career. On debut he gave many stupid penalties away and made crucial mistakes. We were in that game right up until the last eleven minutes; what might have been had he not been so erratic? Losing so much momentum is deadly. These failings have persisted for some time and I believe it has something to do with him being overrhyped as an integral hardman. He believes his own hype. Spies has fallen into the same trap. They will never improve, not because they cannot, but because they will not want to. When you have certain kinds of praise, it puts yo in a comfort zone. It feeds the ego and you build an impenetrable wall to reason. The players that have successfully improved and/or resurrected their careers have had humility and honesty to their aprroach to life. Monty comes to mind immediately. Habana sought out help to get an edge. Morne puts in a tremendous amount of work to refine himself,  Chiliboy has come back with a vengeance - no big talk, just keeps his head down and does what he needs to do with assurance, consistency and accuracy. I'll end this here.

 

Der Aristokrat, I agree with a lot of what you say, expecially regarding Bizmark and Chilli. For starters, Bizmark for me has never played to his potential and I think you have hit the nail on the head with why that is. He has such self confidence that it  has actually become arrogance, and that is not a good thing. I say this because, although he is an outstanding athlete who is obviously incredibly strong, he seems to think the basics of rugby don't apply to him. His body position going into contact is completely wrong, but because of his strength, he often gets away with it, but can you imagine how effective he would be were he to get the basics right? Also, his discipline is totally unpredictable, sometimes he is fine, and others he is nothing but a liability.

As for Chiliboy, he is a player that has actually been playing some very good rugby for the last little while. And, like Bizmark, is like another loose forward. In fact, he is often a more effective fetcher than the other loosies in the Bulls pack. A very underrated player.

Aristo you are always an interesting read.....even if I can't agree with much of what you say... eg that Jean, Bekker, Lambie and Bismarck are test flops. These are four of our very best players at test level....and I include Bekker who has clearly shown he belongs.

What surprises me is that for all your detailed analysis..... eg a Jean pass that wasn't made back in in the 2006 EOY tour......you miss all Fury's botches.

In the RWC for example he missed the Welsh number 8 badly, man on man, for a potential match winning Welsh try

In the QF he had a two on one overlap with Habana outside, and he threw his pass too early and high and behind Habana, clear try scoring chance lost

He was the lucky receiver of F du Preez's charge down, and much as you accuse Jean, he ignored open players outside him and did that silly winding run back into the pack, clear try scoring chance lost

And when Jean broke cleanly several times he never backed him up, in the most profligate case leaving it to Lambie further out, if Fury was on Jean's shoulder where he should have been it was an easy try.

There has always been huge hype surrounding this player.....but the stats, try scoring excepted, never support that. And if you analyse the details of his game, you see tackles avoided (particularly if the other side is rampant), backline moves that take place without him, and rotten passing. Even his tries come disproportionately from games against weaker teams.

Given you remember Jean's supposed negatives from a less important YE tour....it just surprises me you can't recall how Fury helped lose the RWC. Some might think you are biased.

Card nice to have you back but wheeew that post was riddled with stuff I cant agree with.

Lack the energy right now to unravel it!