Three wins, and a suspicion
The All Blacks arrive at Ellis Park on Saturday with a clean tour record. They beat the Stormers in Cape Town, then the Sharks, then the Bulls, the last two without much trouble. Sir John Kirwan looked at those three results and decided they were worth almost nothing.
Speaking on the Rivals podcast this morning, the former All Blacks wing argued that none of the warm-up sides played anything like the team New Zealand actually face this weekend. “I think it’s a bit more of a conspiracy theory out there, I think Rassie’s told those provincial sides to play nothing like the Springboks, we haven’t even seen high kicks,” he said. “We haven’t seen kicking to the corner and a lot of mauling, there’s been no resemblance to what we’re expecting.”
The complaint has a logic to it. South Africa go into the series ranked No. 1 in the world on the back of a game built on the aerial contest, the corner kick and the driving maul. Three matches against opponents who avoided all three leave Dave Rennie’s side untested in the exact areas that will decide the Test.
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Matfield pushes back
Victor Matfield, South Africa’s record cap holder, was on the same show and did not buy it. He watched the Bulls game at a rebuilt Loftus and described a crowd that came alive when the home side rallied after the break.
His explanation for the empty seats elsewhere was economic rather than tactical. Ticket prices are steep, there are two Tests on the Highveld, and supporters choosing between Ellis Park and Soweto have to pick one. He also pointed at a structural problem that has nothing to do with Erasmus: with so many players contracted overseas, provincial depth in South Africa is nowhere near what it was 15 or 20 years ago.
On the squad itself, Matfield backed the coach. Erasmus kept most of his Test group in camp and released only a handful, among them Johan Grobbelaar and Elrigh Louw, both of whom changed the Bulls match in the second half.
Kirwan is not letting it go
He returned to the Bulls, and to their approach in particular. “The Bulls coach comes up and says: ‘Hi Victor, I’m a South African and guess what, I’m going to try and play the All Blacks at their own game’,” Kirwan said. “Wouldn’t you sack him straight away? It just smells of conspiracy.”
Saturday settles which reading holds. Either the All Blacks have spent a fortnight preparing for a game that will not be played, or they have banked three wins on foreign soil and a squad that has stopped worrying about it.
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