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Comment: Rob Houwing
Cape Town – Hope springs eternal so, as has become reasonably customary, a broadly “improved” Vodacom Super 14 campaign has been touted for the five South African sides this year.
Such optimism is not completely baseless - all of the Sharks, Stormers and Bulls boast formidable squads and a few of the luminary overseas sides have haemorrhaged key personnel to northern climes.
But critics tipping a compelling, multi-pronged South African push for semi-final places may not have properly factored into their views a key, long-time bugbear: that our two minnow sides of more recent years, the Cheetahs and Lions, tend to tour the Antipodes very poorly - more poorly, even, than some of the weaker overseas sides visiting our own shores.
It is true that Australian and New Zealand teams coming “west” to South Africa are here for shorter durations than ours making the long haul eastward, but that is simply how it is with South Africa the most distant of the three competing nations: the phenomenon is hardly going to change significantly.
The Sharks and Stormers, especially, have learnt to live with it, got on with the job and sometimes returned with pretty impressive log-point hauls from the alternately four- or five-week foreign expedition.
But statistics don’t lie - they still point to a disturbing, all-fall-down trend abroad by the Cheetahs and Lions.
And as much as these teams’ overseas agonies have contributed significantly to their own nether-regions finishes on the table over the past three years, coughing up repeated “five-pointers” to their Antipodean hosts has obviously only harmed the title aspirations of their other three compatriot outfits.
Indeed, so pitiful has been the resistance put up by these highveld sides that the overseas teams hosting them have often cantered to victory fielding near second-string XVs, or at least having the luxury of benching stellar players with the bonus point in the bag maddeningly early.
The Lions and Cheetahs are under pressure to perform, generally, in 2009: they were 14th and 13th respectively last year and, between them, never ended above 10th in any of the last three Super 14 seasons.
And their overseas records are lamentable: the Cheetahs have lost all of their 13 matches since 2006, and notched just six log points out of a possible 65 on offer.
The Lions have shown bursts of promise and resolve abroad in this period, although they slipped back into old ways last year in losing all five games and managing a miserable one log point for finishing within seven points of the Brumbies (just!) in a 28-21 reverse.
It was in 2007 that we were led to assume - prematurely, it turned out - that they had turned the touring corner: they scooped eight points from a possible 20 with closely-fought victories over the Reds and Force.
But 2006 was unrelentingly grim for them and their own, overall record since that year is 10 points from a possible 70 overseas.
Between them, then, the Lions and Cheetahs have “amassed” 16 points out of 135 outside South Africa between 2006 and 2008. In examination-hall terms, it amounts to a spectacular failure, doesn’t it?
One year in every two, of course, the overseas leg is slightly shorter and easier than the other, and this time the Lions have it kinder, with four games against, in order, the Chiefs, Blues, Reds and Force.
They have regained some wizened old customers like Jannes Labuschagne and Ashwin Willemse for 2009 and these veteran passport-carriers, for both franchise and country, must help the team management in creating a favourable environment for the rest of the players in New Zealand and Australia.
History certainly suggests we shouldn’t expect much out of the Cheetahs against, respectively, the Force, Reds, Hurricanes, Blues and Highlanders – although even their tour itinerary is not quite as demanding as the Stormers’ one, for instance, and some surprise revelations of travelling steel are overdue from Naka Drotske’s charges.
Visiting Australia or New Zealand for a month or so in late summer or early autumn is hardly a high-speed ticket to purgatory, and coaches like Dick Muir (Sharks), Heyneke Meyer (Bulls) and Alan Solomons and more recently Rassie Erasmus (Stormers) have been successful in instilling a feeling of “adventure” rather than “ordeal” into the minds of their various touring squads.
It is time, frankly, that the Cheetahs and Lions, in particular, embrace the tour concept and banish their oddly wimp-like pining for “ma se kos” … it will do their country’s overall Super 14 cause the power of good.
Cape Town – Hope springs eternal so, as has become reasonably customary, a broadly “improved” Vodacom Super 14 campaign has been touted for the five South African sides this year.
Such optimism is not completely baseless - all of the Sharks, Stormers and Bulls boast formidable squads and a few of the luminary overseas sides have haemorrhaged key personnel to northern climes.
But critics tipping a compelling, multi-pronged South African push for semi-final places may not have properly factored into their views a key, long-time bugbear: that our two minnow sides of more recent years, the Cheetahs and Lions, tend to tour the Antipodes very poorly - more poorly, even, than some of the weaker overseas sides visiting our own shores.
It is true that Australian and New Zealand teams coming “west” to South Africa are here for shorter durations than ours making the long haul eastward, but that is simply how it is with South Africa the most distant of the three competing nations: the phenomenon is hardly going to change significantly.
The Sharks and Stormers, especially, have learnt to live with it, got on with the job and sometimes returned with pretty impressive log-point hauls from the alternately four- or five-week foreign expedition.
But statistics don’t lie - they still point to a disturbing, all-fall-down trend abroad by the Cheetahs and Lions.
And as much as these teams’ overseas agonies have contributed significantly to their own nether-regions finishes on the table over the past three years, coughing up repeated “five-pointers” to their Antipodean hosts has obviously only harmed the title aspirations of their other three compatriot outfits.
Indeed, so pitiful has been the resistance put up by these highveld sides that the overseas teams hosting them have often cantered to victory fielding near second-string XVs, or at least having the luxury of benching stellar players with the bonus point in the bag maddeningly early.
The Lions and Cheetahs are under pressure to perform, generally, in 2009: they were 14th and 13th respectively last year and, between them, never ended above 10th in any of the last three Super 14 seasons.
And their overseas records are lamentable: the Cheetahs have lost all of their 13 matches since 2006, and notched just six log points out of a possible 65 on offer.
The Lions have shown bursts of promise and resolve abroad in this period, although they slipped back into old ways last year in losing all five games and managing a miserable one log point for finishing within seven points of the Brumbies (just!) in a 28-21 reverse.
It was in 2007 that we were led to assume - prematurely, it turned out - that they had turned the touring corner: they scooped eight points from a possible 20 with closely-fought victories over the Reds and Force.
But 2006 was unrelentingly grim for them and their own, overall record since that year is 10 points from a possible 70 overseas.
Between them, then, the Lions and Cheetahs have “amassed” 16 points out of 135 outside South Africa between 2006 and 2008. In examination-hall terms, it amounts to a spectacular failure, doesn’t it?
One year in every two, of course, the overseas leg is slightly shorter and easier than the other, and this time the Lions have it kinder, with four games against, in order, the Chiefs, Blues, Reds and Force.
They have regained some wizened old customers like Jannes Labuschagne and Ashwin Willemse for 2009 and these veteran passport-carriers, for both franchise and country, must help the team management in creating a favourable environment for the rest of the players in New Zealand and Australia.
History certainly suggests we shouldn’t expect much out of the Cheetahs against, respectively, the Force, Reds, Hurricanes, Blues and Highlanders – although even their tour itinerary is not quite as demanding as the Stormers’ one, for instance, and some surprise revelations of travelling steel are overdue from Naka Drotske’s charges.
Visiting Australia or New Zealand for a month or so in late summer or early autumn is hardly a high-speed ticket to purgatory, and coaches like Dick Muir (Sharks), Heyneke Meyer (Bulls) and Alan Solomons and more recently Rassie Erasmus (Stormers) have been successful in instilling a feeling of “adventure” rather than “ordeal” into the minds of their various touring squads.
It is time, frankly, that the Cheetahs and Lions, in particular, embrace the tour concept and banish their oddly wimp-like pining for “ma se kos” … it will do their country’s overall Super 14 cause the power of good.
