Street smart STICK
The Bok backline coach is the man best placed to break down the team’s shortcomings in attack and wants them to think on their feet. Liam del Carme finds out how he and his staff intend advancing the team’s stale and often unimaginative playing style
MZWANDILE Stick believes growing up in the hard lands of New Brighton has steeled him for his job as Springbok backline coach.
Stick got an early taste of the brickbats his job attracts, mind you, even before the Springboks slumped to a 26-20 defeat in the first test of a new era against visiting Ireland last week.
Where he grew up, cunning and an ability to roll with the punches were handy tools.
“I think one of my strengths as a coach is that I am streetwise. I look at the quality of the players and plan accordingly,” he said.
“That’s what I did last year with the Eastern Province Under-19s. People said my players were the smallest in the competition. I had to come up with a plan that was going to suit their strengths.”
His team won 11 of their 12 matches before beating their Blue Bulls counterparts in the final. It thrust Stick back to the fore following his earlier exploits as a devilishly deceptive Super Rugby and Springbok Sevens player.
How, however, does a coach of such limited experience bottle that winning recipe so that it finds appeal in an arena where players routinely yield to play book over instinct?
As it is, the Springbok game plan has been much maligned, but coach Allister Coetzee’s team needs to break new frontiers in broadening the game’s appeal. Don’t however expect Stick to help create something that can be easily blown to pieces.
“I won’t be trying to change things around completely,” he stressed. “We can’t move away from our strengths. But I need to find balance. I need to create an environment so the players can express themselves.”
Are those sentiments the opposite sides of the same coin?
“That is where the balance comes in. You want to give them freedom, but it needs to happen within team structure. If you give them too much freedom they are going to play in the wrong area of the field.”
It is on that point that one of rugby’s truisms hit home last week.
“The difference between Super Rugby and test rugby is that in test rugby you have to play in the right areas,” Stick said.
At the same time, however, he was rather enthused by the streetwise manner in which the Boks, well inside the Irish half, set up a try for winger Lwazi Mvovo from a set piece. “We hardly see that,” he beamed. Stick recounts the Southern Kings’ clash in which Hurricanes flank Ardie Savea routinely disengaged from the scrum in the path of CJ Velleman. “It meant he arrived late at the ruck or on cover defence. The referee didn’t pick it up. We need to be street smart too.
“I have learnt that the New Zealand teams do a lot off the ball that creates space for them. The funny thing now is that when the New Zealanders are doing those kind of plays, everybody is praising them. When we do it, like Damian [de Allende] running a good block line last week, all of a sudden people say it is obstruction.”
Stick speaks with hurried confidence, a trait perhaps essential where he grew up, as was the ability to think on the hoof.
“One thing in life that motivates me is where I come from. It’s a very difficult environment, the township of New Brighton. There are a lot of youngsters who get involved with the wrong things, like crime.
“I want to give the people where I come from hope. They must see anything is possible irrespective where you are from.
“To see guys like Siya [Kolisi], who is from Zwide, and Sikhumbuzo [Notshe], who from when they were young, looked up to me, it is something that drives me to make sure those youngsters get direction, where to go and how to do it,” Stick said.
“I know I am going to have challenges and people will be throwing stones at me. There are also people who are happy for me.”
Last week, the 31-year-old could not help deliver a bright new dawn. Thankfully, it’s still early days.
I know I am going to have challenges and people will be throwing stones at me. There are also people who are happy for me