Lessons from a Bok one-Test wonder
Probably only the most ardent of South African rugby fans will know the name Dugald Macdonald, but he is Springbok number 470, having first slipped the famous Green and Gold jersey over his head in a third-floor room of the President Hotel in Sea Point, on 7 June 1974, while a typical Cape Town cold front splattered rain on to the balcony outside.
Macdonald would wear the jersey that had captured his imagination only once in a Test match, and that was actually a fortnight later when he played in the second Test against the British Lions at Loftus Versfeld.
That’s because he was a reserve for the first Test at Newlands, and in those days the replacements sat in the stadium because the “bench” was hardly ever used.
In a disastrous 3-0 series loss for the Springboks, he was destined to become one of the unfortunate one-Test wonders as the national selectors panicked and chose 36 different players for the four Tests, the final match in Johannesburg being drawn.
According to veteran rugby writer John Bishop, who covered the tour, “Dugald should have been there from start to finish, he was one hell of a player. One of those guys who were simply forgotten about in the chaos of the 1974 tour, a powerful No 8 with excellent ball skills. He should have been a Bok great”.
Macdonald has just released a book about the whole experience – the series being one of the most traumatic in South African rugby – called Ja-Nee.
It is an engrossing look into the past, a study in how the mentality of Springbok rugby was built and how those attitudes still influence it today, but as with all great writing, it also brings applications and warnings for the future.
And it’s not just about rugby, it provides a fascinating snapshot of white South African life in the 1970s.
It is evocative, humorous and thought-provoking.
The sun was shining brightly on that mid-winter’s day in Pretoria, but Macdonald makes a decent argument for the Springboks not so much being panicky as arrogant.
They were convinced that the Lions couldn’t possibly be better than them and a few changes would sort out their scrum and allow them to dominate possession.
It’s a recurring story in our rugby: Back in 1992 when we returned from isolation and expected to still be better than Australia and New Zealand because “the Currie Cup is the strongest competition in the world” and instead lost both Tests comfortably.
And then just last week the Bulls travelled from Pretoria to Italy, everyone back home confident that they would be returning from their jaunt with the Rainbow Cup, only to be played off the park by Benetton Treviso.
When South African rugby retreats into the laager mentality, we tend to become dangerously insular when cut off from international trends.
Macdonald was not your typical Springbok of the 1970s, he was a city boy, schooled in Cape Town, an Oxford Blue and also played for Parma in Italy and Toulouse in France.
Some might say paranoid 1970s South Africa was never likely to give him many more than one Test cap.
This broader world view has allowed him to identify an over-reliance on physicality as being a possible albatross around the necks of the current world champions.
“Physicality is great at the right time and in the right place, but so much thought needs to go into it otherwise it’s helluva easy to get carried away. Fortunately we have really good leaders in the game now,” Macdonald told me.
* Ja-Nee (Flyleaf Publishing) available in book stores and online.