Coetzee shambles rambles on
SA Rugby’s decision to retain Allister Coetzee and the bulk of his staff at the helm of Springbok rugby was as inevitable as it was flawed, writes Craig Ray.
At a time when rugby is crying out for a Springbok team that will again compete at the highest level‚ all we can expect is a holding pattern in mid-table – at best. There will be no closing the gap on England‚ New Zealand and Ireland at the top of the game in 2017.
Coetzee’s first year in charge yielded a 33% winning ratio – four wins out of 12 Tests – which alone should have been enough to get him sacked.
But that only tells a small part of the story. Poor selections‚ muddled game plans and porous defence, rather than improvement over the course of last season, do not suggest any miraculous turnaround just because Franco Smith has been added to the coaching staff.
Smith‚ the Cheetahs coach‚ has a good record and will no doubt add some value to the Bok set-up‚ and Brendan Venter‚ the well-remunerated consultant coach‚ will also bring huge vats of rugby IQ when he is formally unveiled as defence coach.
But like a government with a president out of touch‚ all the best people in the world will not be able to carry out their work if the boss undoes it with one or two bad judgment calls.
On last year’s November Tour to Britain and Italy‚ this correspondent spoke to several people in the squad and there was discord over tactics and team culture.
How is that suddenly going to be rectified with all the same personnel in place‚ bar one?
The outlier is backline coach Mzwandile Stick‚ who was never appointed by Coetzee, it has to be said. He is the only casualty in the coaching reshuffle announced this week.
Stick is inexperienced and was too hastily ushered to the top table of rugby‚ but equally, his influence in the squad set-up was so minimal that sacking him – and that is what it was – was unfair.
Smith essentially took over Stick’s duties on the November tour‚ in an embarrassing situation for both parties‚ but performances were worse.
That is not a sleight aimed at Smith either as he was parachuted into the squad days before it departed. What was he supposed to do in a handful of sessions?
The entire set-up and planning in 2016 was a shambles and Coetzee’s late appointment has been used as an excuse for why matters deteriorated.
But if anything‚ the Boks should have been worse at the beginning of the 2016 international season and gradually improved over the year as Coetzee put his plan into action.
Yet they won three of their first four Tests and then lost seven of the next eight including to Italy in Florence.
The excuse that there was no time to plan and prepare does not hold up when matters became worse the more time the squad spent together.
There are myriad reasons why SA Rugby retained Coetzee‚ some of which will only be known to the inner circle.
For one‚ there are not too many world-class coaches out of contract at the moment, so, finding a replacement is not easy or cheap. Secondly, it would have cost a huge amount to sack the incumbent because his performance clause does not kick in until year two of his four-year contract (how that was agreed is a mystery).
There was also political pressure to retain Coetzee and the only solution around the problem was a typical South African rugby answer – fit a square peg into a round hole by adding more lieutenants to prop up an ailing general.
In a statement on Monday, Coetzee promised improvement‚ which when you consider the current standard‚ is not promising much at all.
He also continued with the line 2016 was “unacceptable” and there were “no excuses”.
Because it is so bad that no one is even bothering to come up with excuses any more. It is all just hot air that the rugby public must inhale without question. /
THE ONLY SOLUTION AROUND THE PROBLEM WAS A TYPICAL SOUTH AFRICAN RUGBY ANSWER – FIT A SQUARE PEG INTO A ROUND HOLE