Nothing has changed after all these years: the same coach, the same fundamental problems. We have a generation of largely mediocre Test nations, yet once again we have squandered an opportunity to dominate ruthlessly.
The loss was disappointing for several reasons. There were the painfully obvious selection blunders, some of which have persisted for well over a decade. But there is an important distinction between an individual hindering a good game plan and a game plan that gives the individual very little opportunity to succeed. Yesterday, I thought we saw both.
I can scarcely remember the Boks putting together more than two phases, never mind several phases with coherent intent. Given our enormous physical advantage, I thought they would have benefited from something much simpler: repeated tight phases in one direction, with runners angling inward, forcing New Zealand to continually fold and reload, before shifting the ball back through the backs into the space created on the opposite side. Nothing revolutionary—just a definite pattern that would have given our physical superiority a platform from which to genuinely hurt the Kiwis.
Instead, we repeatedly saw those ridiculous deep, backward passes. It sent a muddled message. On the one hand, we apparently wanted to dominate the gain line; on the other, we voluntarily surrendered metres and momentum through clumsy passes behind the line. Even our close-quarter passing was exceedingly poor.
You have to work with what you have. Even a team relatively devoid of talent can play functional rugby if its system is built around the abilities of its players. My problem with this coaching regime is that we seem to have a rugby philosopher who is more interested in imposing his model than in understanding the particular abilities and potential of the men available to him. The players are expected to fit the philosophy rather than the philosophy being shaped around the players.
And then there is the political element. I believe he has made a conscious decision to accommodate political pressures in selection, and the rugby consequences of those decisions cannot simply be ignored.
We have never seen the Boks consistently play a functional, rounded game under this coach. I see many of the same problems today that I saw during his involvement in 2011 and again from 2018 onwards. A leopard does not change its spots.
Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of this defeat is the quality of the opposition. This is a very poor All Blacks side by their historical standards. They were good enough to punish South Africa's sloppiness, certainly, but make no mistake: they were there for the taking. They are an extremely limited New Zealand side. A simple three-man press repeatedly had the Boks moving backwards, while relatively straightforward combinations were enough to open us up for large gains.
Finally, the refereeing. I deliberately leave this until last because it was neither the primary reason for the defeat nor the first place we should look when analysing what went wrong. South Africa created enough of its own problems.
Nevertheless, that scrum sequence in the second half—where we came away without points and New Zealand subsequently scored a try—was, for me, the decisive passage of the match. More broadly, I thought the officiating was deeply inconsistent. I logged at least eight incidents that I believed warranted serious sanction, yet South Africa finished with two cards while New Zealand received none. Whatever one's view of the individual incidents, that disparity demands scrutiny.
That was particularly disappointing given the magnitude of the occasion. A Test of this significance deserved a contest remembered for the rugby rather than one overshadowed by controversy surrounding the officiating.
Hopefully we see none of this repeated going forward. More importantly, I hope the Boks find within themselves the clarity, discipline and ruthlessness to produce something worthy of the green and gold. This side possesses enormous physical resources. It is time they were given a coherent game plan capable of exploiting them.
