Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus said the team had to keep innovating to stay ahead of the opposition.
Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus said his innovations are far from over, and we may see some in this season’s Rugby Championship, which gets under way in two weeks’ time.
In the season’s four opening games, the Springboks beat the Barbarians 54–7, Italy 42–24 and 45–0, and Georgia 55–10.
South Africa fielded 48 players in these matches, though Erasmus said he would still like to give opportunities to Jaden and Jordan Hendrikse, Quan Horn and Renzo du Plessis this year.
Traditional centre André Esterhuizen packed down at flank in the opening game against the Barbarians. A ‘hybrid player‘, Esterhuizen played flank in attack and dropped to centre in defence.
Then, in the second Test against Italy, the Boks played a short kick-off to induce a scrum, and introduced the world to the midfield “fake lineout” maul from open play. The latter led to a try, while World Rugby later deemed the former an intentional infringement.
The Springboks employed no tricks in the Georgia Test but named three uncapped players in the front row – an extreme rarity in its own right – and played Cobus Wiese at No 8 though he (just his second Test) had never played there in all his professional career.
‘You’ve got to keep innovating’
Erasmus named a tried-and-tested squad of 37 players for the first two Rugby Championship matches against Australia, played in Joburg on 16 August and then Cape Town on 23 August. Separate squads will be named for New Zealand and Argentina closer to their fixtures.
Erasmus said the defending champions would continue employing their tricks.
“You’ve got to keep innovating,” he said. “We’ve got one or two more plans and ideas up our sleeves. Opposition teams now know what we’re about and are developing systems to counter us. We’ll also definitely still use André Esterhuizen to continue in that hybrid role.”
Evan Roos omission and the eighthman experiment
Wiese stood in for his brother Jasper against Georgia, after he received a ban. That was in place of specialist eighthman Evan Roos, who is absent from the squad but remains on standby as a back-up.
Asked whether he would play a specialist eighthman or stick with Wiese, who was decent at times but seemed out of sorts in his first game in that role, Erasmus was confident in his plans.
“There’s different guys with different skill sets, but we feel the eighthmen we have in the group currently [will perform]. With Kwagga being able to play there, Marco [van Staden], Cobus… And Jasper Wiese also comes back in that second All Black game. All is good there.”
He said they had organised with Stormers coach John Dobson that Evan Roos would get game time and work on identified areas while on standby.
“We don’t want to waste guys’ time where they are just training with us, when they can actually play for their franchises or Currie Cup teams… Evan might come into the mix a little bit later.”
