What have we learnt under Meyer

I had great expectations, I had Meyer down as our rugby saviour given his domestic record. What soon became apparent was that his years out of top flight coaching had left him out of touch with the modern art of test rugby. Instead the old Bulls style of 10 man rugby dominated our performances - where the kick and chase prevailed.

A 58% record in his first year is poor and hardly surprising given his game plan and average to poor team selections. There was blind faith in players clearly past it, or never quite test standard in the first place.

Part of my great expectation was the fact that we had a new generation of exciting talent at our doorstep, in fact the best assortment of young talent I have seen since readmission in my books. This was evidenced by the showings of 3 of our S15 sides that ended up in the top 5 of the table.

Meyer had it all and much to work with. With all this talent about, how could we fail?

Well instead of investing in these youngsters we had Meyer select the likes of Morne at 10 and hand a past it Jean the captaincy playing out of position at 13. As the year moved on we saw him completely lose the plot with selections like Steenkamp, CJ, Cilliers, Heinke v/d Merwe, Liebenberg, JC v/Rensburg, de Jongh and Franco v/d Merwe - players that were past it, out of condition or just not test material. This list was selected at the expense of our exciting youngsters. It took him how long to invest in a player like Lambie?

It was the youngsters that led the way in terms of performances - Etzebeth being the forerunner......with the likes of Vermeulen, Coetzee and Goosen adding substance.

Another concern regarding Meyer is his player management - his treatment of Hougaard was shameful, here we had one of our best attacking weapons reduced to a worthless wing. We had JJ, Jantjies and Daniel discarded after having no or very little time playing under him, we had Taute play well against Ireland and told it was his best test to date only to be discarded for the next two tests in favour of an out of depth de Jongh. His faith in past it hasbeen props like CJ and Steenkamp sent what kind of message to youngsters like Malherbe, Marcel v/d Merwe and Kitshoff.

These factors all led to Meyers poor results. He has got it wrong on all fronts and nothing will convince me otherwise. Given the talent at our disposal he has sold us short. I dont buy the nonsense that we had injuries, yes we did, but we had more than enough talent to overcome that considering all the players he ignored.

Meyer better have learnt from his mistakes and he best take the time off to review his stance on how the game should be played and which players he should be investing in. 58% is piss poor and just not good enough. Another year like this one and he must go

one message he could be sending kitshoff and malharbe is, " hey, u gotta do more hten work ur ass off if u want to make my team, but once u do make it, ur in it for life, no matter how sh!t u play...........or u could just sign up with the bulls for ur complimentary 3 test Bok pass, LMAO, :oP

No the youngsters didn't lead the way. In the backs, JP, Habana and Jean formed our core. In the pack, dropping Coetzee for Louw was the key change.....giving us a tough and experienced back row. Etzebeth. Was the one youngster who made a real difference.

Saffex

I must admit that I think there are deficiencies in the Meyer coaching management - but not necessarily on the basis outlined by you.   Gact is I believe Meyer could have done better in certain respects and those include -

*    the appointment of assistant coaches who really are problematic;

*    his player selection ; and

*    his handling of out-of-form players

The main problems are basically the first two - with some complications relating to the second issue resulting in the third one being the result.   However, lets look at the three issue and see why Meyer could have dne better.

Appointment  of Assistant Coaches

It was always evident that urgent attention needs to be paid to coaching to overcome the problems encountered in the period subsequent to 2010 - a period where the senior players ran the coaching process and the coaches were in fact peripheral.    Most of the senior players were in fact past their sell-by date - so the foundations were not sound at all.  

Meyer made the serious mistakes of -

*    appointing Loubscher as backline coach ; and

*    doing the usual the Bulls way and appointing  a forward coach as attack coach.

Loubscher cannot be regarded as a backline coach of note and with advancd levels of expertise and the result was really problematic.   That led to disfunctioning of the backline in general - basically because player inadequacy was never addressed properly.    Deficiencies in players went hand-in-hand with what Meyer saw as his game plan - which in fact could also be the reason why any game plan Meyer has in mind could not work properly because of player deficiencies.   In this regard there are signs that Meyer in fact is not really stuck on a one-dimensional plan - but his coaching staff is not capable of coaching the players to produce anything like he would actually like to see happening. 

In essence I think the main problem to be addressed urgently are to appoint -

*    a backline coach with an advanced level of expertise;

*    an attack coach with overall capacity - in other words not strictly confined to forward coaching only; and

*    specialists that can deal with specific player performance problems on an individual basis.

The above would lead to ultimate development of a 15 player utilization structure and not a more restricted and one-dimensional approach at present in evidence.

Player Selection

This really was a minefield this year since -

*    a sustantial number of players - who effectively should have been replaced as early as 2010 - finally left the scene and had to be replaced; and

*    the injuries to very capable players that left them sidelined through much of the season.

Meyer actually was placed in a bad situation - which in his own words resulted in him making serious mistakes in player selection.   There are indications that Meyer - who despite his departure from the Bulls as coach - maintained close ties with that franchise and was no doubt influneced by his assistant coaches -

*    started off by selecting a high percentage of Bulls players in a situation where the Bulls were not really the leading franchise insofar as performance is cocncerned;

*    selecting players he was "familiar with" - in other words not always selecting them on performances; and

*    in squad selection made a mistake in that he picking squad members that he never intended to use - leaving serious problems when he was forced into using under-performing players in certain positions - an example of the latter being the De Jongh problem as to center play.

I am not going to dreal wih individual cases here - but rather in the overall situation that came to the fore in this approach.   The familiarity issue mentioned resulted in an absurd situation where total disasters were selected without regard to performance and promising youngerplayers were ignored.    It alo resulted in a plaayer like Malherbe travelling the world after being called up to the squad on two occassions  - without any intention to actually use him at all.    That is why absurdancies like Van der Linde and Steenkamp were in the squad.   It also led to selection of hasbeens as part of the squad - whilst serious deficiencies in other positions could not be addressed adequately in away games.   Matter of fact is there are capable younger players that would have performed better than the selected players - but were in fact ignored.    

I must be frank and believe that players should only be selected on the basis of proven performance on Super 15 level and not on the basis how they perform in the Under 20 WC.    The younger playes that could at least have been in the squad includes players like Jordaan, Kitshoff and Malherbe - who played positive  rolls in Super 15 against the top players in Zanzar.    In general I think the performance of younger players - but also established players - should be placed under the mircroscope in the 2013 Super Series compeition and that performance should be the basis for selection - irrespective of whether they are already in the team or not.   

In the latter regard there are some players in the latest squad who should be viewed harshly as well and the same principle should be followed as to players coming back from injury.  If anything but performance is thenorm in player selections - Meyer will get the boot after another year of unsatisfactory performances if he continues with his previous basis for selection.   In any event Meyer realized he made mistakes in selection and that could lead to a positive change in the relevant regard..

Performance Deficiensies 

Although not by all means the only cases - I am going to deal here with three specific players as an example of inadequate addressing of problems.   The players to be dealt with are -

   *    Morne Steyn;

   *    Francois Hougaard; and

   *    Francois Steyn.

I know you will disagree about the latter two - but whether you like it or not - there are problems in performance that should have been addressed properly and not in the way it was done.

Morne Steyn

There was already in Super 15 indications that Morne has developed serious deficiencies in performance and that was carried through to the tests.   Morne went from bad to worse as the test season progressed and the views expressed related to "coaching Morne to fix his ever-decreasing level in kicking" as if that was the only deficiency to be addressed.    It took Meyer 8 tests to realize that Morne could not continue ar flyhalf and even then he persisted in the believe that Morne should remain in contention.

Francois Hougaard

Hougaard was in the same boat as Morne Steyn.   His early performances in the POM tests went downward rapidly - so much so that in the PE test he really  was a bad joke.   Meyer included him also as a player whose kicking vows should be addressed.   There were other obvious deficiencies that also crept into his game - but they were also left unattenderd.    Instead of using expert scrummies to attend to the obvious deficiencies - Meyer took the easy way out and moved Hougaard to the wing and never addressed anything.   The result was that even in a subsequant CC game - Hougaard showed the same deficiencies as was the case earlier.   In recent remarks Mattfield indicated that that would be the route to be followed by the Bulls and the question remains - why did Meyer not follow that route - and why the easy way out of selecting him as a wing - where he incidentally failed badly?

Francois Steyn

Based on previous performances everyone expected miracles from Francois when he was selected and the end result was that he showed really no progress in center play - so much so that a very average Wynand Olivier was in fact better than Steyn was in matches he played in.   Syeyn needs some conditioning - he was slow off the mark when he got the ball - tried to run through players - crashballed and failed to off-load balls in tackle situations.   Instead of dealing with the issue properly - nothing was done and if injury did not take him out of contention - nothing would have been done.

In general it is hoped that the franchise coaches and using of expert advice would get Hougaard and Francois Steyn back on trrack during Super 15 next year.

You made much of the bad treatment of Hougaard, Engelbrecht  and Jantjies.   I dealt with the Hougaard issue already.   Unlike you stated Hougaard should have received expert advice - without that he was going nowhere.    Engelbrecht was sent back to the Bulls after coming from the bench and playing 15 minutes only.  He subsequenrly played in the CC competition and he really played one bad game after another.   That showed he should not really have been in contention for selection at all - he was a Bulls player that slipped in through the back door.   If Engelbrecht really wanted to stake a claim for selection - he will really have to perform in Super 15 next year.   I do no think that Engelbrecht was dealt with badly - he could have been in contention if he showed anything on CC level - he showed zilch - and a poor De Jongh got in ahead of him.

Jantjies is a special case - the issue is that Jantjies have some good points and some extremely bad ones as well.   Whether he should have been in the squad is a major question.   Fact is he has too many deiciencies to be in the squad based on present performance and his deficiencies became strakly clear in the Sowero test.   Meyer kept him on the bench for much of the season and ever really used him in tight test march situations, because he really was unreliable insofar as defence is concerned.    All-in-all present indicarions are that at this stage of his career Jantjies is not an international level player - and we will have to see whether he improves next year in accordance with the high expectations of Coetzee.

SUMMARY

Dspite th issues dealt with above - I still think Meyer got a pass mark of 6/10 for coaching and that he could have done better.   Meyer himself said he made mistakes and it is likely that the situation would improve next year.   We can look forward to next year and see whether Meyer in fact learned from his expereiences as a coach this year.   Still a win ratio of 7 out of 12 matches should be improved upon - if not he could be harshly judged in future.

@mike great post as always

lets be honest meyer has not appointed the most complete set of support staff and that will be his downfall in the long run i believe. there is much more room to expansion on that front. as per my other posts a attacking coach position for example is a role specification on its own and is one of the most specialists positions one can find in rugby. same goes for a skills coach but most teams merge those roles together. never in my life have i ever heard nor seen a forwards coach labeled a attacking coach. i do mean never. 9/10 times the attacking coach was or has experience as a backline player or coach but attack as a system on its own needs a professional not a 2 bit star eyed forwards coach that cant even barely perform in his current role yet alone coach a crucial area of the game like the cohesion on attack.

the points that is being mentioned is nothing new nor anything that out of the ordinary. the common practice everywhere in the world so not following that trend is showing that there is anti progressive approach that will at the end of the day cost certain coaches there jobs.

people harp on the injuries ext but it has been the same for everyone this year so with the amount of depth and the type of players that south africa are producing we cant play the current brand of rugby as that does not suite the players strenghts that are running with the ball in hand and creating space and scoring tries. that is our current generations biggest strong suite.

• November 29, 2012
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Debate has raged in the past few days about whether the Springboks’ end-of-year tour to Ireland and Britain was an unqualified success or not. Let’s look a little deeper.
By Craig Ray

I’ve been in some heated arguments myself on the matter and it was a subject of much discussion on Sunday following South Africa’s 16-15 win over England at Twickenham.

I made the point on Twitter that the Proteas are rightly praised for showing grit in forcing a draw against Australia in Adelaide, while the Boks are widely condemned for apparently only showing grit in winning all three matches on their northern hemisphere tour. Why, I asked?

The expectations for the Boks seem unreasonably high while people seem to expect the worst from the Proteas, so are delighted with a non-result, admittedly against massive odds.

I’ve decided to look a little more closely at people’s expectations versus the reality of results on end-of-year tours, taking the beginning of this century as my sample.

The reason is simple: British teams and Ireland, with the exception of England, took at least five years to catch up professionally so scores in the late 1990s were simply a reflection of the gulf that existed between north and south at the time.

Also the demands of Super Rugby and Currie Cup have taken an increasingly physical and mental toll on our players, which wasn’t as obvious or serious in the 90s.

I’ve been told the Boks should simply wipe the board with northern hemisphere sides like the All Blacks do, but in the past 12 years reality and expectation have drifted further apart.

Reality bites
One prominent blogger, before the Scotland game, predicted a Bok win by 10 points and the proceeded to hammer them after they won by 11 points! Did he seriously expect a 46-36 result against Scotland at Murrayfield? (That’s the problem with bloggers – Ed).

Taking the three opponents the Boks played on this recent tour – Ireland, Scotland and England – and doing a comparison of their clashes in Dublin, Edinburgh and London this century, a startling pattern emerges. Startling that is, if you believe in the Boks’ God-given right to supremacy over northern opponents.

Between 2000-2011 the Boks played Scotland at Murrayfield five times, winning three and losing two. SA averaged a winning score of 22-13 with the Boks scoring two tries to Scotland’s one per game.

Against Ireland over the same period the Boks played five, won two and lost three in Dublin. The average score was 15-21 to the home team with Ireland outscoring the Boks by nine tries to eight.

And against England the Boks had played eight, won four and lost four prior to this tour. The average score was 24-19 to England with the Poms outscoring the Boks by 15 tries to 12.

This year the Boks won all three – Ireland 16-12 (one try to nil), Scotland 21-10 (two tries to one) and England 16-15 (one try nil). They were better than average, only conceded one try and were undefeated, which had only happened on three previous tours in 20 years since readmission and only once (2008) in the period we are looking at between 2000-11.

I admit it wasn’t always pretty (although I found their physicality and commitment compelling viewing) and they have a lot of growing to do as an attacking force.

But given the time constraints coach Heyneke Meyer has been up against, coupled with injuries and retirements, his first task was to get the basics right – set piece and defence. With more time and work, attack will grow now that the foundations have been set.

The tour was a success and those that think not need to judge them against reality, and not outdated perceptions about the opposition.

About Craig Craig Ray is a sports writer for the Times and Sunday Times newspapers specialising in rugby. He wrote 'In Black and White: The Jake White Story', the most successful sports book in South African publishing history, which sold 220 000 copies. He also commentates for SAfm and writes for various international and local publications. Posts by Craig →

Ireland- 

One win against Ireland- marginal. Against an Irish B team that were cobbling together a team with little to no experience. The All Blacks would have hammered this lephrechaun team 50-0

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Scotland-

Tonga destroyed them with a far more convincing performance

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England-

The boks were outplayed for much of the match. Strong defence but not much else and a very fortunate try.

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All 3 games could have been lost. So athough happy this end of the year tour did not dispell my uncertainty of a game plan that lacks a backline on attack

Ireland- 

One win against Ireland- marginal. Against an Irish B team that were cobbling together a team with little to no experience. The All Blacks would have hammered this lephrechaun team 50-0

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Scotland-

Tonga destroyed them with a far more convincing performance

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England-

The boks were outplayed for much of the match. Strong defence but not much else and a very fortunate try.

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All 3 games could have been lost. So athough happy this end of the year tour did not dispell my uncertainty of a game plan that lacks a backline on attack

@sharkbok mate ot be fair your few lines reads light years more common sense that poor plonker craig ray's one eyed views. its rather the same as those that turn quickly as soon as the boks lose. to be fair the opposing teams were woefull and parring a fluke try for the boks we were very lucky not to have lost 3 games.

as much as it hurts me in saying it the quality was poor and had nothing of world quality about it. the AB would have rapped that irish team of second stringers.

What have we learnt. Well that Meyer basically knows his stuff and snapster obviously doesnt. Hahhahahahaha

As that article posted by Ek says -  it was a great  achievement winning these three given the injuries and player exhaustion. But still we are compared to the abs who send over a relatively injury free sqaud that is fesh and has been together far longer!!! The mind boggles at the analytical ability being applied here.

Muncher claims injuries have hit all teams equally -"people harp on the injuries ext but it has been the same for everyone." with this type of mindless analysis no wonder these Meyer bashers get it  so very wrong and have landed uo with huge egg on visogs! Bwahahahahaha

No face up to the plain facts oaks. Meyer has a 25% losing record. Two matches lost would have been won if Morne had kicked normally. The test in Dunedin should hav ebeen won by some 20 points or so given a decent kicking perfomance. I am not even counting duffed try opportunitites just kicks at post.

I do believe these wise oaks have failed dismally in evaluting the situation. If they were cricket lovers they would have berated the Proteas for drawing the recent test  against Oz. Its very amusing really - Hahahahahahaha

Back from the sun and fun and straight into the Wet Coast weather here in Canada.

Well here goes,

We and SA Rugby have learnt nothing from HM first year as manager.

Besides appointing sub standard coaches he obviously has a share in the company manufacturing Springbok gear.....with the number of morons he has selected.

Lucky wins in the end of the year games....in my opinion.

Looking forward to the S15 season and the Queens plus Earl at the Stormers.

Trust the rest will assist HM to get his act together for 3013 and beyond.

I agree the ABs are much more likely to beat Ireland, Scotland or England by big margins. But that misses the point. The ABs have the backs to play a much more explosive game. We have a new, struggling half back combination, one test qualified centre, two great wings one of whom always seems to be injured.....and no fullbacks that know how to join the line.

But that doesn't mean we wont beat the ABs. We will beat them as we always have, by establishing dominance in the pack....same way we beat the NH teams. That doesn't lead to blow outs.....but it makes us the only team in world rugby that are a threat to the ABs. No other team has an area of strength where they can really hurt the ABs, unless it's France's sheer unpredictability.

This was a gutsy tour....as I pointed out in my thread "Bravehearts". I guarantee you every Springbok involved grew as a player on this tour.

3013 AJ? I see you are predicting meyer will be retained after the next RWC!

Wrong again Moz, we have quality backs with a fool of a coach who does not employ a gameplan that brings them into play nor a coach who knows who to select amongst the backs. Your only test qualified centre happens to be part of the problem, he is past it and a liability and therein lies one of the issues.

Beeno

I don't think that I was unfair insofar as rhis issue is concerned.   I in the mian concentrated on issues Meyer himself said - he himself said he made mistakes in player selection  - and I tried to identgy where he did too my mind make mistakes.   He himself spoke about players he was familiar with as well.   Whay he did not say anything about is his assistant coaches selection - but I really believe I dealt with that issue fairly as well.

I also said he deserve a pass mark after his first season of tests.   I do not think Saffex is correct in that he wants youngsters selected whilst they are not even playing on CC level yet - they should in fact only be selected if they perform on a sustained basis in Super 15 level.   There has already been enough failures in that squad.  

I sincerely believe that the key for future selection should be sustained good performance in Super 15 only and that under-performing players should not feature in the Springbok team again.   Simultaenously - if Meyer select foreign-based players it shoud alsobe done after effective evaluation of their pergormance on the same basis as well.    

By the way Beeno - the big IF they kick ay goal properly means nothing - if my auntu had balls she would have been my uncle.   Dangerous to base arguments on ifs and buts. 

Dave we haven't had a running game, except briefly when Eddie Jones was called up by Jake. Take your hero Mallett for example. I was at Twickenham for that Aussie/Bok RWC semi. All he did was rely on de Beer's drop....the crowd booed....Oz charged and de Beer dropped! If he simply prepared a decoy move off de Beer's drops we could have broken them wide open 3 or 4 Aussies were always charging de Beer.

On the other side Horan who the Boks had owned for the prior year, was given so much space by Muller, that he ran us ragged.

Worst coaching effort by a Bok coach....we had forward dominance, a much better kicker, more pace out wide and all we could do was kick drop kicks. The hypocrisy of Mallett dumping on Meyer is breathtaking.

Mozart

Saffex's backline would be a joke.   It will consist of players that showed zero in tests and even less on lower levels - ot worse still - have not played on CC level as yet.    He keeps on about Taute who himself said he wants to play at full back and not at center. 

He refuses to recognise deficiencies in players like Hougaard and Francois Steyn - and also put his faith in  some Under 20 centers to fill up the void.

Where I do agree with Saffex is his statement abour De Villiers.   He was the best center - but in fact no real bright spark something like inthe land of the blind cockey is king -  and he is nearing the end of his playing career.

I stay with my statement that player selection  should be based on sustained performances in Super 15 next year - and to avoid selection of absurdities like Steenkamp - selection of NH players should be evaluated also on the basis of performance - nothing else.    

Moz, I'm not advocating and all out attack approach, we need to find the balance, which is exactly what the AB's do and what we did in that second test against Oz - that should be our model.

All those worthless up and unders need to be cut out

Dave we don't agree about the players, but I am on the same page on the up and unders. I would also cut out the third and fourth phase running into packed defences....do it five times and the chances are you will lose the ball.......one or two forward phases and then move it beyond the stacked defence.

Agreed

Now I am really in serious TROUBLE  - I am in agreement with Moart and Saffex on this one.

Only question remaining - how do we get there?

The only thing we can hope for is that Meyer has learnt from his mistakes of an average to poor first year in charge

Saffex

I agree with yoou about that.  He can start off by replacing his backline and attack assisten coaches and as to future selections as a second point put all potential Springboks under the microscope and study them carefully to see how they perform over the full Super series and pick the top performers.   If he persist in his ideas on selection of NH players - he should study the Heineken Cup performances as well.

Hopefullywe then we wont get absurd selections like Van der Linde, Steenkamp and De Jongh in future - and it will cut out the failures at present in the team.

Aside from that he can get a few specialists to deal with player skills development in critical positions  in the backline.   I don't think it is neceesary for the wings -but really crucial for the center and scrummie positions. 

Blaming his assistant coaches is short sighted, the issue lies with Meyer himself