Where is Bok rugby going?

Last year it was the return of CJ v/d Linde and Guthro Steenkamp..............both have been complete flops with CJ discarded.

This year we have had the return of Fourie du Preez and are about to see the return of Bakkies Botha and Jaques Fourie.

One would swear that, that was enough, but no......its Victor Matfield on his way back next year. Who else is to join the geriatric ward.......Danie Rossouw, Schalk Burger, Juan Smith, Pierre Spies, BJ Botha, Butch James, Marius Joubert?

This is all becoming a FUCKING joke and insulting to Bok supporters. If Meyer thinks we are going to beat the world with these old farts on board, he is even more stupid than I originally thought. 

Out with the new and in with the old seems to be Meyer's motto. Perhaps Matfield is a bridge to o far, but Bakkies and Fury are better than the incumbents.

My guess is Stphanie will be on the bench against Wales....Bakkies may very well start. Oddly enough I think JJ may start, but may not last more than 50 minutes and Fury will start the remaining games.

Mozart

I doubt whether you have seen a single game played by Fourie and Bakkies over the past two years - so you have no idea what to expect from them.   In any event even good performances on CLUB level - is rather meaningless, since the level they play on is  below  Super 15 or CC level.

If we have to take into account the level of performance we are getting from other club returnees - what would make them still acceptable?   Steyn came back from France in poor physical condition and he has 18 months later not recovered the necessary physical form   Steenkamp was a poor choice from the start - so bad that Toulouse rarely play him in their starting 15 and if they do their whole scrum disintegrates.    Pienaar was bog ordinary and sometimes a serious liability at scrumhalf.   Even the great Fourie Du Preez came back and was brilliant in the Pumas game for 15 minutes, but anything but in his first full test and ran out of steam in the AB test a week later and at best was bog ordinary in the latter test.

The above leaves me in serious doubt as to the Club players selected by Meyer and their real achievements in the Springbok team.   What is evident is that their performances before departure to play club rugby  as Springboks  was way better than they are now performing as Springboks. 

The above examples leave me questioning whether players like Botha and  Fourie will be the answer to deficiencies in the present team.  There is one thing evident  and that is that Etzebeth is a better lock than Bakkies ever was.   Both are enforcers, but Etzebeth has the edge  since  he is faster in speed and more athletic than Bakkies ever was.   

Xtramick

There is a number of questions in respect of your latest remarks.   The first one is that Toulon will not release Bakkies to be an advisor to the Springboks - he is released to play in tests and if  he does not play, they will scream blue murder and point it out as a contravention of the IRB regulations.

The second one is that I cannot remember ever seeing Flippie playing at 5 - neither on Super 15 level or on test level.   Even when he came off the bench to replace Kruger, Etzebeth moved to 5 and Flippie played at 4.   In any event Flippie is not a good line out jumper - whether he plays at 4 or at 5.

Ceradyne

I accept that this was the selection - but as far as I can remember in actual line outs on the field of play Flip took up position in front of the line-outs against Retallick and not against Whitelock in the Eden Park test and he definitely did not jump against Douglas in the Brisbane test.   In both cases Etzebeth was calling the line out calls  and that is normally done by the no 5 jumper - or so Mozart would swear to.  

In any event your Bulls hero Van der Merwe managed to take only one line out ball in each of the two tests - a real asset in line out jumping in your book.   That shows no real asset in line out play in whatsoever position he was actually jumping in the line outs.   

Mozart

I wrote about the usage of NH players by Meyer in some detail as to actual performances and also mentioned with a statement about ever seeing any game either of the two players played in.

Too cowardly to respond to that message - but what else can one  accept from the high priest of performance fabrication.

 Ha ha fat Dave reckons dont fix it if it aint broken..We know what aint broken..Those turnstile arms of JJ.. They work like a charm. They swing wide open to let patrons in!!

Why fix it if it aint broken?? So a 38-27 loss to NZL at our fortress is working well is it? We have a bigger problem at 13 in JJ than we do at 15 in Kirchner and 10 in Morne. Yes, Morne misses too many tackles but a missed tackle in close is a lot less dangerous than a missed tackle outwide. No excuse for Morne. He must still get that sorted or move on but at least he has many more guys around him to cover tackle if he does slip off. A lesser defender at 10 is far better than that at 13..You need your centres and players out wide to be inpenetrable and we have the opposite in JJ.

Fat Dave, please stop saying JJ had a great game..He fucken missed an easy tackle at that level on a skinny man that ultimately saw SA spirits (fans and players) drop! Fourie to start..JJ to fuck around in the Vodacom cup..He cant tackle for shit and he should start being overlooked at Super rugby as a centre too...Learn to tackle and see how you go at wing JJ.

 South Africa did'nt play badly at Ellis Park.  It's just that the AllBlacks were AWESOME.

..haha told ya Bean Brain the loser would be crushed...gotta watch that Beauden Barret - just too much style and class.

... but with the top three No 10s of world rugby in the NZ team it wouldn't matter who you put up against us... 

  Bean Brain , always avoid alliteration....thanks mate for all the lessons this year like when we whipped you in the historic one day cricket series victory in SA ,

... not to mention the Sevens series ,

 ...thanks also for the lesson at the Olympics when lil ol NZ achieved a greater medal count than SA with only a fourteenth of the pop.

...and thanks for the lesson on how to win with only 14 men at Ellis Park ...Ellis Park and Eden Park was the ol one two i warned you about mate..

...those were great lessons this year that we wont forget in a hurry...so on behalf of NZ i would like to say how much we appreciate the contribution you've made to making us such a great sporting nation....cheers buddy.

Boklogic

I know you differ with Saffex as a matter of principle - but the Morne Steyn issue is not really correct insofar as the Ellis Park test is concerned.   The problem is that Morne in that test missed 3 of his 4 misses which led to tries being scored and no real cover by any other players were in evidence in 2 of the three cases.    The case where I do give due recognition that Morne shared less of a blame than Engelbrecht in the Barrett try case - is however not exonerating Morne completely for blame in that debacle. 

My point is that Egelbrecht has the same deficient tackling technique as Morne - both players are deficient in that department of the game.   

Beeno

The question here is not where we are heading -it is whether we are not going to avert that heading by playing weaker older NH Club players like Steenkamp, Pienaar and even in his last two games - Fourie du Preez - and now the unpredictable Botha and Fourie and even potentially Mattfield as a way to get to the top and stay there. 

I think that all reasonable people really think that care should be taken to only select NH club players when we have a serious void in specific positions or in the cases of proven extra-ordinary top players like Habana.    I am not satisfied at all that most of the has been older players are really of any significant benefit to the Springboks and it really is madness to even think about a player like Mattfield insofar as future selection is concerned.         

Cancer, do us all a favour and ply your time to something other than commenting on rugby.........I got to paragraph two and fell asleep.

Get this into your thick skull, you know fuck all about rugby so don't bore us with your shit  

Cleancut

Morne is indeed a questionable case.  Many people differ from you about his true value as a Springbok.   If it was only the test in Ellis Park - where he failed badly - that is taken into account - it may be an exception - but he alos failed previously - for instance in the Bulls - Brumbies semi-final.   Morne always will be  questionable selection - even at the best of times.  

Then there is the issue of Engelbrecht - where I think Saffex is way out of line and where his selection is indeed questionable.

There can be no question about the foreign based players - they left SA after performing way above the level where they are now after they returned for recent tests    So there are reasonable doubt whether they should be selected on reputation only and that applies to all of the Club players - not only some.

Fourie du Preez played a wonderful game in the Pumas test - but showed much less in the Aussie test and ran out of steam in the AB test - so he did not shut my mouth yet. He may have been better than what we have available locally and I see no reason why Kockott should not be tried.

However, none of the present foreign-based players have been a house on fire  and there is reasonable doubt whether any would be better than some local players in future.    I would rather start developing  Etzebeth and Du Toit as our key lock combination than  gamble on Botha and Mattfield - who are way past their prime  in  any  event.