The 2013 bightmare is back

Watching the Lions yesterday I thought back of the performances of Jantjies in 2013 for the Stormers.  However, yesterday after a season of good performances, Jantjies was by some distance the worst SA flyhalf of the three who played.
His kicking at goal was atrocious - it cost the Lions 10 points in missed conversion attempts,    Typical of his performances for the rest he kicked a kick in from his own 22 directly into touch and his passing game often enough put the backline under pressure,
As if the above was not enough the Lions backline defense was at best porous and the main culprit was Mapoe who decided to donate a try to the Shark by an intercept pass.
The only backline players deserving some credit was Vorster, Combrinck and Coetzee - the rest were putrid.
If what Jantjies produce yesterday is what he produces in the upcoming semi and RC tests it will be a return of my Jantjies nightmare with a vengeance.  
  
 

Jantjies does not like the rush defence. He likes some time to run at an angle before making a decision. 

SB
That may be so - but what about his near total breakdown in kicks at goal and his poor defense and other mishaps?
Jantjies was replaced early yesterday (at minute 62) - not to save him from potential injuries, but to save his team from defeat if he continued any longer.
By the way Jantjies under pressure is an ugly sight to see and yesterday he was under pressure.  In the recent test series he was never really under pressure - but he also showed some problems which were ignored because of the easy wins by the Springboks.   One case I remember for example was a penalty line kick where he failed to find touch.

Damn the 2013 Bightmare isn't Louis Saurez.....it's a typo. Lots of fulminating about Jantjies...but I read the Oom predicting a Sharks win at half time, nothing about that. I guess he bit off more than he could chew.....haha.

 And I read you saying Combrinck lost it and yet he and Vorster got a win for the Lions.  
If Jantjies was not replaced at minute 62 the match would have been lost.  

 Surprise surprise. The guy has a bad game and suddenly he is the worst thing ever. 
Mike for someone who claims to be objective you sure do fail to see the big picture. 
Why not just admit that you don't like Jantjies? 
You're probably right. Unless he can have a flawless season he is obviously not worth it. Yesterday's game was no more of a big game than any of the three French tests. So really he is three from four. But sure, let's conjure up memories from four years ago to try and discredit the guy.
Give it a rest.

 Plum, I think its clear as daylight that Maaik doesn't like Jantjies....and yesterday's Sharks would probably put at least 15 on the poor Frogs.

 Plum
For me it has nothing to do with dislikes or likes - it has all to do with performance.   I am still worried about Jantjies under pressure.   The Lions had an easy run during the 2017 Super Rugby series until yesterday.   Similar with the French tests in June.
I am worried about Jantjies under pressure - like happened last year in tests and in 2013.   He was a match loser in a lot of games.   He would have lost the game yesterday as well - Jantjies under pressure is a serious problem for the teams he played in.   I still hope for the best insofar as he is concerned - and he should be given chances to play - but if he crumbles like he did yesterday - it will be a nightmare.  
Lets wait and see what happens on Saturday in the semi and for the RC tests and then make up our mind about the gu y. 

 Mike...and what about last year's quarters and semis in SR? What about his performances against Ireland? What about the away games against the Kiwis? 
My opinion is that for some reason you are very eager to hang the chokers tag around Jantjies' neck. 
Cool. Let's assume that you get what you want. Where to from there? Lambie? Pollard? Cronje? Or shall we chuck Willemse and Bosche in at the deep end?
Or you might just have to accept that Jantjies was still a kid in 2013 and since then has been very consistent. Unless of course you'd like to use last year's Bok season as evidence. In which case I'd ask you to show my anyone aside from Eben who did well/improved under the mess of 2016 Bok coaching.
You accuse Moz of being biased but..log, splinter eye something.

 Plum, Jantjies is the last man standing, but I would like to see Lionel given a proper run from the bench.

 Me too Draad. 
It's just unfortunate for us that Jantjies is the only 10 in SA who has received decent coaching personally, and as part of a team. 
He isn't our most skilled 10. Nor is he necessarily our long term solution. My money is on Du Plessis and Bosche/Willemse. 
It just irks me when we have a guy who is giving it his all and has worked his way to the top gets naysayed on minimal evidence...from four bloody years ago!
For me, I want all our teams and all our players to succeed. I don't care if he's an ahole, a quota or a mama's boy. If he is from SA and is on the field I'll support him. If he is clearly out of his depth or consistently poor then I'd want him replaced by the next in line. Bias doesn't factor into it.
It just seems like some here get a kick out of players failing. Like they would rather a player fails and they are proved right about him than he succeed and they are proved wrong. It says something about a person's mindset when you think that way. People have this way of wanting to drag others down to their level so that their own failures become more acceptable to them.
I hope every 10 in SA has a great season in 2018 and that Jantjies has to fight for the Jersey. Unfortunately the reality right now is that aside from Cronje who is largely an unknown quantity there is literally nobody else. Granted Cronje should be given a run out against the Argues and maybe OZ too. Give him the last 20 of a few games and see how he does.
 So according to Mike, who rates himself as a respectable poster, the best option is to slate Jantjies(our only present hope) up and down because of one bad game. It's just such  South African thing to do. 
And to make this post even longer. I say it's an SA thing to do because had Greame Smith for example, achieved for any other country what he did for SA, you'd not find a single person there who would diss him. Yet in SA every other twat reckons GS was a loser, choker, coward etc etc. Ask them how many test series victories against England and OZ he got and their response will be "Ja but did he win a WC?" 
We have so few positives coming out of SA yet seem to be too stupid to appreciate the bit that we do have.  

Plum in the same spirit, let me add a list of guys who acheived great things for SA sport who became 'unpopular' and were constantly attacked: ... Skinstad, Marius Joubert, Matfield, Montgomery, Morne, Schalk, Vermeulen, Alberts, Graham Smith, Kallis, Amla. ... These guys were some of our very best.....but they ended their international careers drowning in spite. It's something which is uniquely South African and shameful.....and that's why I take up their defence so often.

B S - nobody criticize players who perform - except you.   And who is Graham Smith?  

B S - nobody criticize players who perform - except you.   And who is Graham Smith?  

 Graeme Smith

Jantjies doesn't have the ability to handle pressure.

It's not a matter of writing his performance off to JUST another "bad day at the office" ... but rather being realistic ... facing the facts ... and being objective enough to see that he has a massif problem with pressure ... which comes from limited space and time.

It doesn't take much to rattle him. He's a slow thinker and if you deny him space and time everything goes to sh!t ... even his kicking.

Some teams have taken note of this. The Canes rushed him last season and he fell apart. They have him figured ... and guess what ... they're going to apply the same tactics come Saturday. 

I know you like him, Plum ... but tell me in all honesty, how many more times must he panic and crack under pressure before you'll accept that he is not one you'd want to go to war with.

He has disappointed his team so many times in the past ... and pressure is the common denominator ... every time ... sometimes it's self inflicted pressure.

He nearly lost the match for us.

Where did the pressure come from? Not from the Sharks ... but rather the ocassion was to big for him to cope with ... and he spoke himself into disbelief before the starting whistle even sounded.

I dread the coming match against the Canes.

I wish we had someone else to use at 10. We've put all our eggs in one basket with him. He's been our go to guy for the last few seasons and we just haven't learned our lesson.

 

 
Tell me, Tottie ... exactly what great things has Elton Jantjies done for South African rugby?

A single accomplishment will do. Thanks.

Also ... regarding your list of so called "greats" ... most of them were good players ... but I would never go so far as to call them "our very best" ... unless of course it's another "con temporary comparison" you're using.

LOL!!!

 CC
He did play poorly on Saturday. The whole team played quite badly, same as they did the couple of games before. Jantjies missed easy kicks and chucked a few bad passes. There is no getting around that. Had he stayed on the Lions would probably have lost. I agree with all of that. 
If we are talking about it here then it's common knowledge in SR coaching that Jantjies is susceptible to pressure. Teams try pressure him every week,  but it only rarely seems work. I don't care what the Kiwis here say but the Lions home game against the Canes last year was riddled with offsides when defenders stole an extra meter, sometimes more. I made a painstakingly long post about it last year using a video of the match to show the infringements...of which as I recall there were plenty. Aside from that game Jantjies had a great SR season. 
This year, the only game where he struggled was this past Saturday...after how many games, including the Bok games? So for this season he is something like 18/1. That's a bloody good record. Especially when you consider his consistency stretching back to 2015. 
BUT I'm not necessarily a fan of his. I don't like the way he handles himself and I think that much of what he does is the result of a good game plan, good back up and good old fashioned front running. If Rob Du Preez, Dan Du Plessis, Cronje or Pollard played at the Lions then my gut feeling is that they'd get similar results. The Lions pack makes their 10s job an easy one. They constantly have teams on the back foot and it's much easier to make decisions going forward than the other way.
For all the renaissance the Lions have brought, they've also brought Jantjies with them. He is their man and thus he is our man. We can't live in fear and we have to back the guy. Also, it's not like he hasn't paid his dues. All players mess up. Only some have earned the right to be given some rope. After all, his name is in the top three when we talk about credit for the Lions ridiculous good run of form the last few years. And seems less injury prone than most other 10s we have.
If he cracks on Saturday then the evidence will start to mount. If he plays poorly in the RC then we can draw more conclusions. 
For my money it's just unfair to him for us to sit here and wait for him to fail. Let's rather back him.
What is concerning me is the Lion's recent lack of cohesion. Tecklenburg and Redlinghuys are sorely missed. I know most don't like him but Dillon Smith/Smit had an exceptional work rate too and the Lions rucks have looked slower this year as a result of those three lads being gone. They've also missed Mnisi and JSVR. 
Combine the loss of some of their solid players with the fact that Akkers is leaving and maybe we have an explanation for the current form they're in. 
Hopefully the last three games have made them address some pertinent questions and come Saturday we'll see a confident Lions run out. 

The problem is not Jantjies, it is who to replace him with? We all know he blows hot and cold, more hot lately, but as we saw on Saturday, the cold is still very much a factor. Our discussions have been down this road plenty in the past and it always comes back to the the same point. He is not the answer, but he is the best we've got. The others, Bosch and Cronje, are untested at the top level. Pollard is injured and has done nothing in the last two years to suggest he is the answer. And Lambie has had many bites at the apple and never made a solid case for himself. 
This is the current reality. We have no choice but to start Jantjies...for the Lions and the Boks, and we need to blood the young guys ASAP to find a permanent replacement for him. 
I hope he turns up with his "A" game this coming Saturday, because the Hurricanes won't be anywhere near as forgiving as the Sharks were. Actually, not just him, the whole Lions team.   
Go Lions! 

 I saw a game of the Lions last year when Boshoff was at flyhalf and it was the best game of the Lions in the 2016 Super rugby series.
As to the Springboks I hope Pollard can get back and that Venter and Smith get the nonsense he developed at the Bulls can be knocked out of him.   He can still be the flyhalf of the future and that would be of great help.   
Jantjies when given space i s good - when under pressure he is a disaster. 

Actually Turncoat you incredibly dumb bugger, you will notice Jantjies is not on my list.....as for Amla Kallis, Matfield not being our very best......who do you rate? Maakniks? .. Jantjies is a lucky packet, but the only way the Lions will win this thing is if that lucky packet produces the big prize....their game is built around Jantjies.

As usual, Moffie is only a fan when the guy is playing well. One bad game and suddenly Moffie is pretending he never rated the guy!

Same old . . .

 "Jantjies when given space is good - when under pressure he is a disaster. "

Because we here at Ruckers are the only people on the planet who know that pressuring a 10 is important. Obviously putting pressure on a 10 is such a very complicated thing to do since it doesn't just require that you get off your line quickly and close down his space. No, wait, it is that easy.

Funny that. How despite it being easy to do AND highly recommended yet only the Canes last year and the Sharks this year have done it.

So there are two conclusions to draw here. Either the SR coaches are all a bunch of idiots who know less about rugby than we do or in fact most of the teams have been trying to pressure Jantjies and it has only worked for them on very rare occasions.

In the latter case, it would mean that in fact Jantjies doesn't fold when teams close down his space but unfortunately he is human and form time to time teams will successfully defend against him.

Sure, he doesnt have 100% of the answers 100% of the time so lets all jump on the bandwagon and throw the lad to the wolves.

Or this is true...

"Coach what shall we do about Jantjies today?"

"Nothing lads. Just give him some space so that he can create tries against us."

You make me laugh Mike.

Urinal you have me confused with your lying buddy the Pervert.

 Matfield was a medium-rated lock.   Recognized locks said he was not good enough to be in the WC squad for 2015.  Kallis realized he was past it and stop playng - Matfield did not do so and ruined his reputation.  
Amla's rating went down from 3 to 9 and after the latest test went up to 7.   
Howevr, since you know nothing about sport and performances n sport - and rate the players purely on reputation - so what can one expect from you - a real ignorant twit.

 
The good news is that Ackerman and De Bruin are not stupid and have spoken in depth about the tactics used by the Canes that undid us last season.

No doubt a remedy of sorts is being brewed ... but it will only bear fruit if Jantjies controls his nerve.

A jittery Jantjies and all is lost. Cronje will have to look after him.

I doubt the Canes will change their game plan.

Hats off to you, Plum. Your man frustrates me no end ... good on you for sticking with him. I don't know how you do it.

Go Lions. Go Chiefs.



 

Any team facing a SA team with Jantjies at #10 knows exactly what to do.
Close him down, pressure him, hit him hard the first time and he crumbles.
Sure he has had a fair Super series, against the French he was OK and perhaps he is the form #10 presently playing in a dominating SA team in the conference rounds.
But his last performance clearly shows his flaws and courage under pressure.
But even if he had one arm he would still be the flyhalf choice for many.
Lionel is, without a doubt, the guy to get a call up I say.
Sorry, you three Lions supporters.

If Jantjies needs space, it is the responsibility of the pack and the scrum half to make this happen.He is a liability when he has no space. 
In SA we sometimes opt for the safe flyhalf that can tackle and kick long distance touch finders on defence. 
Jantjies has shown more flair than perhaps any SA flyhalf since 2007/recent years.  The main thing is he can get the backline running better any of our other flyhalves. Much better than Lambie or Pollard have done. 

Everyone knows that playing expansive is the way forward, or at least mixing 10 man and 15 man based on the situation.
Jantjies is the best we have for now. 

 sharkbok.....is Jantjies related to u?

@Arthur, yes he is my daughter. How did you know?

Everybody agrees expansive is the way forward, but every tight rugby match I watch.....the Lions/All Blacks or the Super QFs ....are a battle in the trenches. So were all the Six Nations tests.

LOL @ SB! 
Mozter, that may be true, but the Lions don't have a tested conservative flyhalf in their squad, so Jantjies will have to do. We must also bear in mind that he did perform well in knockout matches last year against NZ opponents, so it is not like he can't do it. It just depends on which Jantjies pitches up on the day, and weather or not the Lions forwards can give him front foot ball. 
We shall see.
Go Lions!  

 
Trench warfare is best suited to slow, heavy fields ... where the forwards dominate play ... stamkar rugby as you guys so love to say.

We have a home semi ... in dry conditions ... perfectly suited to our expansive style. It's worked for us these last few seasons ... and besides that, we don't really have a back row that can contribute to that out dated method of playing rugby.

There is no need to change the way we do things. 

We should focus on our own game and not worry about what the opponent's going to do. The last time we tried to play their game we got our asses handed to us.

Yes Shark ... you are right in saying that Jantjies knows how to get our back line away. He needs space and a little time and it lies in the hands of his team mates to provide him with it. 

Let's hope all goes according to plan.

 

The Lions have to play their own game....no doubt about it. Jantjies is the key player in making that work, that die is cast. They might want to let Combrink take the kicks though,,...that would take a huge burden off Jantjies. Combrink also blew a simple kick, but it doesn't affect his game like a miss affects Jantjies. .... As for outdated playing styles.....Barrett passed 42 times in the Lions series, but he kicked 39 times....and if Bosch's last drop wasn't from mega distance the drop could have won the QF. The only thing that is truly new in the game is the weaponized offload......brilliant when it works, but done poorly as by South African forwards, a major source of lost ball.

The Bightmare bites Pervert and Turncoat in the ass.....hahahaha. Listen to Tokkie, take the opposite position and prosper.

Dofdoos
Jantjies kicking at goal was better today - but his performance - especially in the first half - was not convincing.  Even the commentators made remarks on that score.
Discussing rugby issues with you is a lost cause since you know zero about the game.    

 LOL Mike

Jantjies had a very good game actually. Offloaded well, put players into space a few times, tackled well and kicked like it was a practice game. But sure, he threw one intercept pass so lets perpetuate the myth about his BMT.

Other players also made mistakes that lead to points for the Canes yet i dont hear any of their names spoken. Instead we talk about the guy in the team who is under the most pressure and slate his mistakes while ignoring his positives.

Your dislike for the guys amazes me.

I agree, Jantjies had a decent game. Bok fans should feel some relief as you guys need him.

The Lions forwards took control in the 2nd half and the Lions kept the ball. The Barrett yellow card was due to the pressure of the Lions forwards. Lots of advantage was played at the rucks with the Canes going offside

Hilarious to see Pervert and Turncoat squirm. They don't have enough honesty to simply say he had a fine game....it has to be a 'better second half' or " I don't know what they said to him at halftime' ... LMAOFY!