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The Springboks left Twickenham on Saturday rightly feeling chuffed that some of their lost pride had been restored, but a glance through the English newspapers on Sunday morning would have reminded them that many questions posed during the Tri-Nations season still remain unanswered.
The Boks were rightly hailed for their win by the England scribes, several of them former internationals. And there was a general acceptance that the 21-11 defeat to the world champions was a step back from where everyone had assumed England were placed after their good win over Australia. The term “reality check” was used a couple of times in the post-match press conference and in newspaper reports.
But the point that galled former England lock Paul Ackford was that his former team had lost to a Springbok side that had, in a sense, reinvented themselves as the England of old in pulling off their victory.
“The galling aspect from an England perspective was that the Springboks did not deviate one millimeter from the way the hosts expected them to play,” said Ackford. “They were true to their heritage, reducing what can be a complex and intricate game to a combination of arm wrestle and battering ram.”
The general consensus seemed to be that England had lost to a team that played with grunt but little else. It sounds harsh, but it is nonetheless fair comment. The Boks played with a lot of heart and physicality, but it would be idiotic to suggest they played like a well-coached side. This was a match in which the Springboks bludgeoned their way to victory but there was little finesse and absolutely no innovation to the game that was found to be inadequate for southern hemisphere opposition in July.
The Boks won’t be complaining about that now – from the outset of this tour the message that was sent out was that everything was results driven. Winning was the important thing, style didn’t matter. They didn’t quite achieve their objective, for the loss to Scotland was by their own admission unacceptable and it served to throw the previous match against Wales into perspective.
There they won when they shouldn’t, and while there were some South Africans who were talking about the Grand Slam dream having been so close, if Ronan O’Gara had been millimetres more accurate with his late conversion in Dublin on the opening weekend it would have died in the opening match.
But at least in England they were up against the form team in Europe at the moment, one that was dreaming big. Not only that, they were making much of their adoption of a southern hemisphere style of playing, so in that sense the final match of the tour was the best test in the circumstances for the percentage rugby favoured by the senior players.
England were so outplayed at forward, and so poor in responding to the challenge posed by what to them was a relatively rare situation of not having a solid platform to play off, that the test never really materialized.
What is encouraging from a Springbok viewpoint is the bottom line message that was sent out: If you starve the opposition of the ball, then it really doesn’t matter what game they play. If the Boks dominate the All Blacks in a meeting in the World Cup year like they did England, then the Kiwis are going to find it hard to win.
The All Blacks though are far more adept at winning games when denied possession than a northern hemisphere side like England would be, as they have shown on several occasions on their corresponding tour to the one the Boks have just undertaken.
The All Blacks also outplayed England when they met a few weeks back, and it probably isn’t a coincidence that the two sides England did lose to in the Autumn international series were the ones in world rugby that can match and even dominate them physically.
New Zealand remain the biggest obstacle to any Bok hopes of winning the World Cup, and Australia recovered from their disappointing performance against England by showing against France that their attacking game can destroy any team when it clicks.
Note too that both they and the All Blacks uncovered ways to negate the Bok strengths at forward, such as quick throw-ins, something that England did not try to at Twickenham. Instead they backed their pack, something the southern hemisphere teams will not do. For the southern hemisphere teams, superior fitness and pace around the park is the key to beating the Boks, as they showed from July to September.
So while skipper Victor Matfield and coach Peter de Villiers said after the weekend win that they saw it as a victory for the Bok blueprint, they didn’t effectively answer the question on whether they need to grow their game or not. That question can only be answered in matches against the other southern hemisphere nations.
This adds a little bit of interest to the final game of this tour against the Barbarians, although it does need to be noted that the return home of several players, as well as the release back to the northern hemisphere clubs of some others, robs the Boks of much strength and experience.
The squad that remains is geared for an attacking game, so at least Saturday’s match will give us some indication of whether there might just be another way forward.
The Springbok squad for the match against the Barbarians is:
Backs: Gio Aplon, Francois Hougaard, Adi Jacobs, Elton Jantjies, Zane Kirchner, Patrick Lambie, Charl McLeod, Lwazi Mvovo, Odwa Ndungane.
Forwards: Willem Alberts, Bakkies Botha, Keegan Daniel, Jannie du Plessis, Bismarck du Plessis, Alistair Hargreaves, Ryan Kankowski, Bandise Maku, Tendai Mtawarira, Coenie Oosthuizen, Juan Smith (captain), Adriaan Strauss, CJ van der Linde, Flip van der Merwe.
