Cape Town - Os du Randt, who won the Rugby World Cup with the Springboks in 1995 and 2007, has stressed the importance of experience ahead of the 2019 showpiece event in Japan.
Via a column for Springbok Online Magazine, the former prop forward shared some insights into how Jake White's Springboks prepared for their victorious 2007 event in France.
"Jake White left most of the experienced players behind for the away Tests against Australia and New Zealand and even though we only won one of our four Tests in the Rugby Championship that year, we were building nicely.
"This allowed us to sort things out as senior players. It also made us realise that we as players need to take control of what we want to achieve on and off the field. We changed certain things, and Jake and his management team had to stand back to allow that and they did, giving us all the responsibility. This proved how we had grown as a team and that we were ready to take control of our destiny," Du Randt wrote.
Du Randt, who played 80 Tests between 1994 and 2007, added that getting enough game time and fitness would be paramount ahead of this year's World Cup.
"I believe the golden thread between our RWC wins in 1995 and 2007 is how hard we trained. This started with management pushing us, but both times the players later took charge of that. We didn't allow anyone to train harder on their own. We persevered as a team.
"Twelve years later and the rugby landscape has changed considerably. Rassie Erasmus won't have as much time to prepare as we did back in 2007, but I think the Boks have a good mix of matches leading up to the RWC."
Du Randt, who is now 46, retired from rugby after South Afric's 15-6 win over England in the 2007 World Cup final in Paris. He became involved in coaching and has been involved as scrum coach at the Cheetahs and Japanese club Toyota Verblitz.