The good, bad and just plain ugly
It has been all downhill under Coetzee
THEY were the best of times, they were the worst of times… no, let’s not beat around the bush, they were just terrible times, rank bad from the beginning to the end, for a Springbok team that started 2016 thinking that the nadir had been reached with the defeat to Japan in Brighton last September.
It was so bad that it is hard to recall a high point that could be listed as the peak for the year. The Boks did put it together in the second half of the second Test against Ireland in Johannesburg, but the fact they were fighting back from a massive halftime deficit makes it hard to list that performance as a high.
Even the individual player of the year is hard to arrive at when all things are considered. It must really be Pieter-Steph du Toit, who was consistently good when he played at lock and was also outstanding for the Stormers in Super Rugby. But it is hard to think of Du Toit without remembering the two dummies that England scrumhalf Ben Youngs sold him when he was playing on the flank at Twickenham.
It is hard to find a new player who advanced his cause, or even a more experienced player who managed to defend his reputation. J P Pietersen and Bryan Habana were both more bad than good when they played, Willie le Roux was in and out of the team, Willem Alberts had his moments early in the game against England but looks past his best, Eben Etzebeth wasn’t as good as he has been, and Lood de Jager was a pale replica of the barnstorming lock who debuted for Heyneke Meyer two years ago.
Adriaan Strauss produced one of the performances of the year in leading the Boks to victory over Australia in Pretoria when the national team had reached a dire juncture in early October, but although his lineout throwing and other primary aspects of a hooker’s game were sound, he wasn’t often enough in the forefront leading by example and through onfield deeds.
Yet while the Boks seldom showed the passion and fire that you’d expect from a proud Bok team, it wasn’t the players who bore the brunt of the criticism. Instead it was coach Allister Coetzee and his backroom staff who came into focus after a season in which it appeared the Boks lacked a playing identity throughout.
Most of the even short-lived Bok coaching reigns had redeeming features to them. You might have been able to argue, for instance, that the Boks started to play with more flair when Carel du Plessis coached them for just eight matches in 1997, and his record included a 61-22 win over Australia.
Instead of showing signs of improvement under Coetzee, the Boks were regressing more sharply the longer the season endured. If you factor in the draw with the Barbarians at Wembley at the start of the November tour, the Boks won just one of their last nine games.
When Coetzee took charge of the Boks in the first week of June there was a lot of talk of the Boks introducing the extra attacking dynamic that was lacking under Meyer, and as they headed into the first Test of the year against Ireland at Newlands, there was an air of cautious optimism among critics.
After all, while the South African teams had generally performed poorly in Super Rugby, the top team, the Emirates Lions, was flying, making the competition final, with several top Kiwi teams falling victim to them along the way.
But Coetzee had also made it clear he would not be revolving too much around the Lions, and when Elton Jantjies ended up having to replace Patrick Lambie early in the Newlands Test, it was clear that he and his franchise halfback partner Faf de Klerk were struggling to adjust from the Lions approach to what was expected by Coetzee. The jury is out on whether those players just aren’t good enough, or whether they just need a chance to play for a different coach.
We will never know how differently the season may have turned out for Coetzee and the Boks had the South Africans managed a win in that Cape Town game. However, losing to Ireland at home, the first Bok team to suffer that fate, was a disastrous outcome for Coetzee.
There may have been glimpses of a road not taken when the Boks stormed back in the second half in Johannesburg, with Lions players coming onto the field to fill key positions and the side embracing a Lions approach on their home field.
Ireland are one of the up-andcoming teams in world rugby but the squad they sent to South Africa was understrength. So while the Boks edged a game that could easily have gone the other way in the series decider in Port Elizabeth, there wasn’t reason for much chest pumping and optimism.
Coetzee stuck to his line that the team was growing and that it was a matter of time before everything clicked over 80 minutes. Sadly those who believed him waited in vain, and after a hard fought win over Argentina in Nelspruit in the opening game of the Rugby Championship, it was all downhill.
It is hard to decide whether the abject display that led to a record defeat to the All Blacks at Kings Park or the tired performance that led to the Italy defeat in Florence marked the lowest point of the year. The summation of just how poorly the Boks went in 2016 is probably found in the omission of a home defeat to a 14-man Ireland team as the list of contenders for the low point of the year.
Or for that matter a 14-point defeat to Wales. It was only the third Welsh win over the Boks ever and yet they celebrated as if it was expected. Which, of course, it was. And that was what was most disturbing about the Boks’ downward plunge, both in terms of performance and the world rankings.