Wynand Olivier vs Stepfontein....is there progress?

These two centres are remarkably similar, but for some reason Step enjoys far more fan support and better press. But to me they are twins.....similar in size and strength. And in pace, Wynand regularly struggled in the pace stakes and Step was easily burned by Farrell in November. So who is the better player?

Defensively I'd say its a neutral....both tackle inside their channel reasonably well. Not always though as LeStat has demonstrated with Frans monstering Step, and of course Heaslip ran right over Olivier to set up a Lions try in our third test loss. About the same in channel.

But better than their defensive monitoring of the outside gap....which is very feeble as we saw with Iaone powering past Step last week....as did Speight with ease last year. And of course Giteau often gassed Wynand. Poor but equal would be the verdict here.

On the attack they both have the Step er step....but not much else. No offload, no deception, no speed off the mark.

Which brings us to the one point of distinction....the pass. Wynand did have a fine pass, something Step lacks at this stage. So on balance I see a lot of similarities  but a clear  win to Wynand in handling....he is the better player.

By offloading I mean the stuff Frans does, SBW does and de Allende does....not simply making a pass.

Well fact is Olivier was a damn fine centre, better than Jean at times, but ultimately Jean was better and has in fact been our best 12 since readmission by some distance, so the fact that Olivier sat behind Jean in the pecking order is little reflection on how good Olivier was.

Olivier was certainly better than a player like de Wet Barry.

As for Serfontein, he has achieved more than Jean has at the same age, has a far better attacking skill set so ultimately will prove to be better than Jean ever was.

Last weekends two tries was just a little reminder of how good this guy is.

Oh and when did Frans monster Serf, kindly point this fabrication out - its a lie

Its just a pity we have such a useless Bok coach who sees fit to play him out of position at 13......what an idiot, about as big an idiot as the person questioning his credentials, the same clown who thought Adi Jacobs was a class act.......say no more 

Bullshit he was never given the opportunity to play at 12 regularly at test level and therefore to expect him to have settled and make a huge impression is pathetic.

He played most of his tests off the bench and many were on the wing or at 13......his consecutive test appearances at 12 were very limited.

He lived in the shadows of Jean and rightly so. Had Jean not been about Olivier would have thrived at test level as he was a damn fine 12. 

Barry was the more complete 12.....what a fucking laugh......he was useless with ball in hand and his only strength was defending......he was not close to test standard.

Lestat you keep confirming how little you know abaout the game.

Saying Barry was better than Jean and Olivier is insulting

Bullshit, Barry did nothing of a sort, he was a boring crash ball centre who offered NOTHING with ball in hand......there was no flair or creativity in him.

He was not close to test standard.

As for Olivier, no he was never given an extended run at 12 and therefore to judge him at test level is unfair.

Frans might have set the world alight as a youngster, but lets face it for various reasons he has failed to fulfil the status of a great player........he has been solid but never special.......but then again that probably had a lot to do with him being played in so many different positions each week.

Frans should have only played 12 and made it his own. He is and was better equipped than Jean to be a true great at 12.

Jean was never a wing, he has been our best 12 since readmission.......Barry should never have played a single test, he was a very average rugby player who could tackle, much like Morne being a very average rugby player who could kick.

Jean, Serfontein, Frans Venter, Frans Steyn, de Allende, Odendaal, Vorster, Mnisi and Andre Esterhuizen are all better 12's than Barry was with ball in hand.  

Barry was as useless as they come, even worse than a player like Barritt who is just as good a defender but has a little more to offer on attack.

Serf would have made a meal of useless Barry.....hell even useless Adi Jacobs was better than Barry