There have been replays of all the tests played by the Springboks this year - some the full tests and ohers only the highlight packages and I watched them all.
There has been long discussions on some players and they were given huge write-ups by some of our members so I watched the games even the highlight packages and found out why the players are dubious Springbok selections at best:-
Franco Mostert
Franco is a very mobile player - but there are serious deficiencies in his game that makes it problematic when it comes to Tight 5 play:-
* Although he makes a lot of tackles the quality of the tackles are substandard. The tackled player goes forward and the opposition can easily continue with attacks because of off-loads or quick recovery of balls. When defending near the tryline and the forwards attack the other forwards tackle the opposition layers back - while he really is not acceptable in defending against forwards. A typical example is the Barrett try scored in the dyiung minutes of the Pretoria test - his defense was sub-standard,
* The fact remains that he is not capable on test level to start and control the operating of rolling mauls, Ibn all games he did not succeed ibn a single rolling maul going forward. The problem is his defense against opposition olling mauls is poor or even non-existent - looking on standing around behind while other players had to really defend the mauls.
* His ball carries was ineffective and he does not place the ball for easy recovery and too often the balls are not recovered after his carries.
On the whole all the issues raised relate to physical deficiency and the question as a whole if he is not reducing the efficiency of the Springboks Tight 5. Looking at the games I believe he does and the step-up from Super Rugby to test level is a bit beyond his reach.
Andre Esterhuizen
This guy is physically very strong as a center and against weaker defense he can break the line quite easily, However he has a number of problems not expected from test players. Those include -
* serious pace deficiency;
* poor reading of the game when it comes to defense - which results in low tackle counts and missing of tackles;
* poor organization of defense wider out causing too many opposition overlaps;
* when tackled he has problems in placing balls resulting ion slow recovery ore even possession losses,
I think that one of his main problems is that he is somewhat clumsy and is easily tackled by individual players,
Looking at the games it is clear why Erasmus seemingly prefer to not giving him playing.
There are obvious problems in the Springbok squad that needs to be attended to - but Mostert can be easily replaced by more physical and equally hard-working players like De Jager and Schickerling. However, Esterhuizen is not the answer at center - and the issue should be reviewed and better players found.
The problems in the team remains the loosies and the centers, so we will have to look for the answer in the forthcoming Super Rugby Season - with due regard ins omec ases what is happening in NH club rugby. .
