Can Allister carry Bok brothers?
IT WAS rather ironic that, when I heard the news of Heyneke Meyer’s resignation as Springbok coach, “He Aint Heavy, His My Brother” by The Hollies started blaring through my car’s speakers.
According to songfacts.com, the title for the song came from the motto for Boys Town, a community formed in 1917 by a Catholic priest named Father Edward J. Flanagan. Located in Omaha, Nebraska, it was a place where troubled or homeless boys could go for help.
In 1941, Father Flanagan was looking at a magazine called The Messenger when he came across a drawing of a boy carrying a younger boy on his back, with the caption, “He ain’t heavy, mister – he’s my brother”.
Father Flanagan thought the image and phrase captured the spirit of Boys Town, so he got permission and commissioned a statue of the drawing with the inscription, “He ain’t heavy, Father, he’s my brother”.
The reason for the irony is that the Springbok team are lost after a disastrous 2015, which featured defeats against Argentina and Japan. They also don’t have a home, as far as their game plan is concerned, after Meyer went back to the “skop-skiet-en-donner”, and then “skop” some more, during the World Cup.
But who is going to be the Boks’ Father Flanagan? And who is going to be that coach who can actually lead them out of the orphanage and get them to stand on their own two feet again?
But those are the wrong questions. The question should actually be how can the South African Rugby Union get the Boks out of the quagmire and make them feel loved again.
Yes, appointing a new and worthy coach should be the first priority of the custodians of the game. But, before they do that, Saru has to get their house in order after a bit of a nightmare year on and off the field.
The reports of a new contract for Meyer before the World Cup kicked off, sponsors not renewing their deals and Saru’s response to the critics about lack of transformation – which was basically a bitter and spiteful open letter – and the fiasco surrounding the Eastern Province Rugby Union are some of the blots on their copybook.
But what about the new coach? Allister Coetzee certainly has the inside track as far as the Bok job is concerned, but Saru’s main priority should be to arm him with the best possible assistants to pick the Boks up off the canvas.
I think the days of a Bok coach who is deemed to be untouchable must come to an end. The last two national coaches have basically had “yesmen”, instead of guys who can challenge the status quo, and guys who have actually got international coaching experience.
I think the next Bok coach should be more of an organiser and a coach who works more on strategy than actually feeding the ball into the scrum drills. The sort of role Clive Woodward had when he was in charge of England.
One of Coetzee’s greatest strengths is his ability to communicate, whether that is telling the media absolutely nothing in a five-minute rant or whether it is connecting with a player.
If it’s a South African who Saru wants at the helm, then Coetzee is the man, but he will also need to shake off the conservative shackles that the Stormers players are struggling to break free of at the moment.
If he can do that, and he gets quality assistants who bring fresh ideas to the table instead of just running drills, he may just be the man to carry the Boks to “where, who knows where”.
For Saru, though, “the road is long” to redemption. But’s it’s a winding road that they have to take. Sooner, rather than later.