Show him the door

I AM sure everyone with half a brain has already formed an opinion about the results of the country’s rugby team that failed to win the Rugby World Cup.

Everyone also has an opinion as to whether the present coach, Heyneke Meyer, should be called an outgoing or former Springbok coach or not.

Should he go or stay on for another four years? Statistics have been bandied about by each side. Some have pointed out that in the four years since he took over as coach he has won nothing.

He has failed in four consecutive Tri Nations. Some will point out that in those four years he has failed to move the game forward, in fact the new style he played in the first two years was abandoned about the same time that he discovered his long-lost love for the players of a different generation. I am trying to be polite here and not call these players old.

It is hard work to watch our national rugby team play. It is frustrating as the team seemed to have forgotten that rugby has three main basic pillars - run, pass and kick, in that order. They have added another pillar - tackle - and they seem to think that is all that is required to win a rugby game, and of course the incessant and aimless kicking. What summed the coach up for me was when he said, “We do not have the skills - how can we play differently?”

He was explaining the yawning chasm between them and the All Blacks of New Zealand and the dour style of rugby the Springboks were playing.

If ever there was a reason to fire someone, this was it. He is basically saying he does not have the wherewithal to coach the skills needed to play 21st century rugby.

Either that, or he is saying he is incapable of picking the right players to play the type of rugby needed. He had four years to either find the players with the requisite skills or inculcate those skills into those he selected.

In four years he has lost seven out of eight times against the All Blacks, South Africa lost for the first time against Argentina, at home and, most embarrassingly of all, they lost against Japan.

Let us not be fooled by his desperate words.

He said, “I have always been part of the solution and not the problem.” Who created the problem? This man must go, finish and klaar. He has divided the country for long enough.