The Rugby thread

Against Australia we were 17-0, they lost 2 players to injury in the first half, had 2 yellow cards during the course of the match, were playing us at home, yet finished stronger ultimately winning the match... we should have put 30 past them given the circumstances...
 
Werner1975 said:
3/4 from the SA teams in the URC this weekend. Bulls, Sharks & Stormers are through to the top 8. Lions sadly are out.
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Perhaps that is ultimately where the school boy strength finally manifests... we accomplish all that with 1, YES 1 international player... Ben Loader... the rest is home grown while we have in excess of 100 professionals plying their trade in foreign leagues.

Imagine the likes of Pollard, Marx, Lood, Faf, Du Preez brothers, RG, Thomas du Toit, PSDT, Shaakir Abrahams, Bernard Janse van Rensburg, Arno Botha, Reinach, Jan Serfontein, Kurt-Lee, Kolbe, Jean Kleyn, de Allende, Ernst van Rhyn, Hyron Andrews, Ivan van Zyl, Louis Schreuder, Tyrone Green, Ruan Ackermann, Ivan Herbst, Jacques Vermeulen, Kwenzo Blose, Damian Markus, Dillyn Leyds, Nico Janse van Rensburg, Tiaan Jacobs, James Hall, Jaco van Tonder, Joe Jonas, Jeremy Ward, Lourens Erasmus, Khuta Mchunu, Friedle Olivier, Jessi Kriel, Brendan Owen, kwagga Smith, Willie Potgieter, Sylvian Mahuza, Matthys Basson, Jan-Hendrik Swanepole, Dawid Kellerman, Juarno Augustus, Burger Odendaal, Sebastien de Chaves, Jordan Els, Hanro Liebenberg, Marvin Orie, JP du Preez, Tom Botha, Evardi Boshoff, Dan Kasende, David Bullbring, Rikus Pretorius, Tyler Paul, Walt Steenkamp, Jeandre Labuschagne, Sanele Nohamba, etc etc etc etc etc etc being available to play for our domestic franchises???

Yes, I've listed as many names as I can find and that is only the tip of the iceberg. Some are household names in SA rugby and some you may never have heard of. Such is the extent of the player drain....

So when Jake White goes on a rant, hear him out and don't be so condescending or critical of the man and what he is saying...
 
sand_man said:
Perhaps that is ultimately where the school boy strength finally manifests... we accomplish all that with 1, YES 1 international player... Ben Loader... the rest is home grown while we have in excess of 100 professionals plying their trade in foreign leagues.

Imagine the likes of Pollard, Marx, Lood, Faf, Du Preez brothers, RG, Thomas du Toit, PSDT, Shaakir Abrahams, Bernard Janse van Rensburg, Arno Botha, Reinach, Jan Serfontein, Kurt-Lee, Kolbe, Jean Kleyn, de Allende, Ernst van Rhyn, Hyron Andrews, Ivan van Zyl, Louis Schreuder, Tyrone Green, Ruan Ackermann, Ivan Herbst, Jacques Vermeulen, Kwenzo Blose, Damian Markus, Dillyn Leyds, Nico Janse van Rensburg, Tiaan Jacobs, James Hall, Jaco van Tonder, Joe Jonas, Jeremy Ward, Lourens Erasmus, Khuta Mchunu, Friedle Olivier, Jessi Kriel, Brendan Owen, kwagga Smith, Willie Potgieter, Sylvian Mahuza, Matthys Basson, Jan-Hendrik Swanepole, Dawid Kellerman, Juarno Augustus, Burger Odendaal, Sebastien de Chaves, Jordan Els, Hanro Liebenberg, Marvin Orie, JP du Preez, Tom Botha, Evardi Boshoff, Dan Kasende, David Bullbring, Rikus Pretorius, Tyler Paul, Walt Steenkamp, Jeandre Labuschagne, Sanele Nohamba, etc etc etc etc etc etc being available to play for our domestic franchises???

Yes, I've listed as many names as I can find and that is only the tip of the iceberg. Some are household names in SA rugby and some you may never have heard of. Such is the extent of the player drain....

So when Jake White goes on a rant, hear him out and don't be so condescending or critical of the man and what he is saying...
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That's quite a list of players! I've always been a fan of Jake White.
 
sand_man said:
Perhaps that is ultimately where the school boy strength finally manifests... we accomplish all that with 1, YES 1 international player... Ben Loader... the rest is home grown while we have in excess of 100 professionals plying their trade in foreign leagues.

Imagine the likes of Pollard, Marx, Lood, Faf, Du Preez brothers, RG, Thomas du Toit, PSDT, Shaakir Abrahams, Bernard Janse van Rensburg, Arno Botha, Reinach, Jan Serfontein, Kurt-Lee, Kolbe, Jean Kleyn, de Allende, Ernst van Rhyn, Hyron Andrews, Ivan van Zyl, Louis Schreuder, Tyrone Green, Ruan Ackermann, Ivan Herbst, Jacques Vermeulen, Kwenzo Blose, Damian Markus, Dillyn Leyds, Nico Janse van Rensburg, Tiaan Jacobs, James Hall, Jaco van Tonder, Joe Jonas, Jeremy Ward, Lourens Erasmus, Khuta Mchunu, Friedle Olivier, Jessi Kriel, Brendan Owen, kwagga Smith, Willie Potgieter, Sylvian Mahuza, Matthys Basson, Jan-Hendrik Swanepole, Dawid Kellerman, Juarno Augustus, Burger Odendaal, Sebastien de Chaves, Jordan Els, Hanro Liebenberg, Marvin Orie, JP du Preez, Tom Botha, Evardi Boshoff, Dan Kasende, David Bullbring, Rikus Pretorius, Tyler Paul, Walt Steenkamp, Jeandre Labuschagne, Sanele Nohamba, etc etc etc etc etc etc being available to play for our domestic franchises???

Yes, I've listed as many names as I can find and that is only the tip of the iceberg. Some are household names in SA rugby and some you may never have heard of. Such is the extent of the player drain....

So when Jake White goes on a rant, hear him out and don't be so condescending or critical of the man and what he is saying...
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Yes.

Jake conveniently forgets he contracted several SA players when he was coaching Montpellier.
 
Werner1975 said:
That's quite a list of players! I've always been a fan of Jake White.
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Me too, very big fan.

He has his detractors though. As does just about every coach, in every sporting code, in every country.

Everyone and their dog has an opinion and social media is the perfect mechanism from where to voice said opinions.

It is what it is I guess...
 
sand_man said:
Me too, very big fan.

He has his detractors though. As does just about every coach, in every sporting code, in every country.

Everyone and their dog has an opinion and social media is the perfect mechanism from where to voice said opinions.

It is what it is I guess...
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You can't be everything to everyone. You also can't please everybody. That's just a fact of life. Rassie, Kitch, Mallet and Jake are my favourite coaches.
 
netstrider said:
Yes.

Jake conveniently forgets he contracted several SA players when he was coaching Montpellier.
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He certainly did. Karma I guess.. I think he's taking exception to players not honoring their commitments by leaving before their contracts expire.
 
sand_man said:
Conditioning maybe?

It's perplexing to me, how we can claim to have the strongest schoolboy league in the world but consistently under perform at U20 level. 9 3rd place finishes in 14 U20 world cups...
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More like mental strength and development.

Been involved in the system a bit from junior schools to senior, with my son who is 22 now.

The lack of any formal mental conditioning, sport psychology coach at junior lvls is mindbogging. Its such a huge hole, my son has actually decided to try pursue a focus in coaching on that side of things as a career path.

There is a major lack in developing the grey matter between our young players ears in this country and it certainly shows when hit the semi pro leagues at u20 etc.
 
sand_man said:
SA 45 NZ 48, U20s... Quite a game.
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I was at these games this weekend. Was a really great experience. Here is a brief summary.

Arg vs Aus:
The Argies have a great pack of forwards. The scrummed and mauled REALLY well. Their centres look strong as well. They were SUPER quiet though. Only once they had some momentum were they talking to each other and communicating.

Aus played well and Im sure they are going to be on the up and up in the next few years. Unless these guys go play League or something. The fullback was good and they had some decent backs. Lots of individual brilliance from them. I would say that Arg was the better team and Aus had more gems. Don't understand how ZA lost to them though...

ZA vs NZ
The game was far closer than it should have been... for the NZers. They are such a well oiled machine, very few mistakes and handling errors. Lots of chatter and communication and LOADS of gesturing and togetherness in that team. Their hooker is a beast, and I'm sure he will be a big deal one day. They played a bit one dimensional in that they just employed the dummy runner but honestly... ZA were useless on defence and fell for it all the time. NZ just felt dangerous. Every time they entered ZA 22 it was points. Their backline was also really dangerous, especially their 15.

ZA was poor. Outside that opening 20 mins, it was a just schoolboy handling errors and poor passing. They were also hardly talking or communicating on the field. They were statues out there and looked overawed by the competition sometimes. There felt like a gulf between the two teams in terms of the mental aspect of the game. The kicking was also poor from ZA. Looked like they had no real objective and just let the NZers run the ball back at us, but in general I would say the kicking was poor across the two games.

Everyone around us was hyping up our backline, but I was not impressed. They tried to do too many dummies and didn't look like they carried very well (I could be wrong here, but our forwards looked better). On defence, they left massive gaps and were way too easily drawn inside and left the outside open which NZ exploited. Was really not impressed by the backs.

The crowd was great though. 15 000 pitched up and were really getting behind the boys. I would say about 6 - 7 000 were there for the Arg vs Aus game too. While I was expecting it I was still shocked that like 35% of the stadium were All Blacks supporters.

Lastly, all the guys were so well-mannered, they played well and took selfies with the crowd after the game. They were all very respectful and down to earth.
 
MuterOfWorlds said:
More like mental strength and development.

Been involved in the system a bit from junior schools to senior, with my son who is 22 now.

The lack of any formal mental conditioning, sport psychology coach at junior lvls is mindbogging. Its such a huge hole, my son has actually decided to try pursue a focus in coaching on that side of things as a career path.

There is a major lack in developing the grey matter between our young players ears in this country and it certainly shows when hit the semi pro leagues at u20 etc.
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Yeah I can agree with this although my experience is perhaps more limited than yours.
But my anecdotal evidence across three different provinces now, the focus in our schools is on size and strength - you can run through someone, you're in. Junior level, penalty 5m out from the try line, it's tap and hand it off to the big guy, he'll crash over.
So when you get to the level where your size is no longer as big an advantage, you get a bit stuck.

I remember back in the day, Kearsney had this 7s tournament, Hilton College were there with Bob Skinstad and this other guy, can't remember his name right now, later played for the Sharks. But they dominated not because they ran through players, but Bob looked to avoid contact. I mean look he was big and quick and agile so a bit of a freak but still. My brother was playing against them, faked an injury to get subbed at half time

Henry Pollock reminds me of him - looks for space, not contact, but still physical.
 
Sepeng said:
Yeah I can agree with this although my experience is perhaps more limited than yours.
But my anecdotal evidence across three different provinces now, the focus in our schools is on size and strength - you can run through someone, you're in. Junior level, penalty 5m out from the try line, it's tap and hand it off to the big guy, he'll crash over.
So when you get to the level where your size is no longer as big an advantage, you get a bit stuck.

I remember back in the day, Kearsney had this 7s tournament, Hilton College were there with Bob Skinstad and this other guy, can't remember his name right now, later played for the Sharks. But they dominated not because they ran through players, but Bob looked to avoid contact. I mean look he was big and quick and agile so a bit of a freak but still. My brother was playing against them, faked an injury to get subbed at half time

Henry Pollock reminds me of him - looks for space, not contact, but still physical.
Click to expand...

Yeah, its a proper issue, and its not only on a player lvl at junior lvl, but the coaches themselves, we losing alot of truly exceptional players at junior lvls, where they don't meet these 'fixed' requirements per the coaches, strength, speed etc, with the actual superior players not being selected, for being that little bit slower, or little bit not as strong etc.

Regularly, kids get shunted into C and D teams are yet the kids dominating the various franchise academy call ups through their participation at club level. Sadly its only a fraction of the actually talented kids, as vast majority, lose interest when shunted down the order by their school coaches, and never see themselves as good enough thanks to atrocious coaching, and the talent gets lost in the system forever.

South African rugby (and honestly, I think our sport in general) has a very real problem wrt quality of local coaching. Amatuer hour.

Its now almost 10 years since began the journey, and that was at primary school. The school in question, head coach, left for another school. Said school had spent every year finishing last in the local league. New coach, and suddenly the boys finished undefeated for the season, and what really stuck out was that the new coaches 1st choice were all players previously C and D, he dropped all the old coaches first choices.

That was the start of the journey, as my son went from D team, social, to KZN schools and beyond from there, simply because the head of rugby, and 1st team coach left and was replaced after a decade of abject failure, but was somehow still highly regarded and was POACHED by another school.

The experience was repeated in highschool. And just saw it unfolding regularly, similiar stories for so many others we met along the way. Rugby succeeds in South Africa DESPITE the schools system, not because of it. Yes, there are some schools that stand out, have good coaches, but sadly, they are certainly the minority and for alot of the time, the kid being the quickest and strongest, is 'enough' to be competitive at school lvls, where size and speed can be an adject advantage, as many 'develop physcially' later, post highschool even, vs those who do much earlier.


The mindboggles.
 
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Sepeng said:
Yeah I can agree with this although my experience is perhaps more limited than yours.
But my anecdotal evidence across three different provinces now, the focus in our schools is on size and strength - you can run through someone, you're in. Junior level, penalty 5m out from the try line, it's tap and hand it off to the big guy, he'll crash over.
So when you get to the level where your size is no longer as big an advantage, you get a bit stuck.

I remember back in the day, Kearsney had this 7s tournament, Hilton College were there with Bob Skinstad and this other guy, can't remember his name right now, later played for the Sharks. But they dominated not because they ran through players, but Bob looked to avoid contact. I mean look he was big and quick and agile so a bit of a freak but still. My brother was playing against them, faked an injury to get subbed at half time

Henry Pollock reminds me of him - looks for space, not contact, but still physical.
Click to expand...
Size, strength and speeeeed!

Been following some school boy rugby closely this year. Some of these boys are MASSIVE especially in the u19 age group.

Cape Town schools like Paarl Boys High and Paarl Gim dominating a bit this year with Paul Roos just behind them.

Oakdale also have a huge pack of forwards. Very physical.

My son is playing U14 this year (not for one of the top schools, but a rugby competitive school who also plays against the top schools), and is 1.84m and 112kg.

Amount of work they have to put in from u14 level already (Monday - Friday practice), long hours, gym sessions etc. is kind of scary.
 
Who's gonna watch some Boks games this season? Just took a plunge and bought some tix for the Italy game at Loftus. Fkn expensive but whatever. Haven't been to a Bok game since 2012 and it was a crap one when we tied England in PE.
 
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