Italy vs South Africa

Springbok team has been announced.

“I’m excited to see what these guys can do on Saturday in what will be a stern Test against a fired-up Italy,” said Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer.

“We planned to make a few shifts for this Test as I’d like to see if these players can make the step up. The guys coming in deserve their opportunities and seeing that we won’t have our overseas-based players available next week against Wales, it made sense to bring a few of them in this week.”

Meyer said he was impressed by the commitment shown by all the uncapped players at training on the tour and that Carr and Redelinghuys are ready for selection.

“Nizaam can cover all the positions in the back-row and his call-up is just-reward after a very good season for the DHL Stormers and Western Province,” said the Springbok coach.

“Julian has been superb for the Lions this season and he’s shown that he can scrum. Both of them are now familiar with our plays and structures and I’m looking forward to see what they can bring on Saturday.

“It will also be a good test for Johan, who I’ve always regarded as a possibility at fullback. He has a great skill-set and a massive boot which will come in handy on Saturday if we have to play in wet weather again.”

Meyer said the Test against Italy will pose different challenges to what the Springboks had faced thus far on the tour.

“They are a passionate nation with a very experienced coach in Jacques Brunel and a world-class captain in Sergio Parisse,” said Meyer.

“The Italian pack is always formidable and their backs are not scared of taking chances. Our focus is to show improvements from our performance at Twickenham and we know it will be a big challenge on Saturday.”



The Springbok team to face Italy in Padova is:

15 Johan Goosen 5 caps, 8 points
14 JP Pietersen 58 caps, 90 points
13 Jan Serfontein 18 caps,10 points
12 Jean de Villiers (captain, 104 caps, 135 points
11 Bryan Habana 105 caps, 280 points
10 Pat Lambie 38 caps, 97 points
9 Cobus Reinach 4 caps, 5 points
8 Duane Vermeulen 27 caps, 10 points
7 Teboho “Oupa” Mohoje 5 caps, 0 points
6 Marcell Coetzee 24 caps, 30 points
5 Victor Matfield (vice-captain, 119 caps, 35 points
4 Eben Etzebeth 31 caps, 0 points
3 Coenie Oosthuizen 19 caps, 10 points
2 Adriaan Strauss 42 caps, 25 points
1 Trevor Nyakane 11 caps, 5 points
Replacements:
16 Bismarck du Plessis 68 caps, 45 points
17 Gurthrö Steenkamp 52 caps, 30 points
18 Julian Redelinghuys 0 caps, 0 points
19 Lood de Jager 7 caps, 10 points
20 Nizaam Carr 0 caps, 0 points
21 Francois Hougaard 33 caps, 25 points
22 Handré Pollard 7 caps, 61 points
23 Willie le Roux 23 caps, 35 points

Hopefully the newbies on the bench gets a good run, I am excited to see Goosen at fullback, I think Meyer is holding Pollard back for Wales.

Hmm, you have to wonder for those who will play 4 tests in the series. No rest for chaps like Vermeulen, Coetzee, Etzebeth, Matfield, De Villiers, Habana, Serfontein. Hopefully they can blitz Italy and bring on fresh subs quick. I would have preferred De Allende for the bench over Le Roux. Pietersen can play 15 and De Allende can play wing and both centre positions.

Wales at home is not a test anyone wants to play with 1 foot in the plan home.

One test too many?

SecretFly wrote:One test too many?

NZ 2012.

How many welsh will be barred from the match

Hibbard, James, Charteris, Davies, Phillips, Davies & Roberts

So that's their first choice 1,2, 12, 13 & 15.

So perhaps

Jenkins, A Hooker??, Lee, Ball, Jones, Lydiate, Warburton, Faletau, Webb, Bigger, A winger???, Williams, North, Cuthbert, Williams

The boks will be without Steenkamp, Botha, Burger, Pietersen, Goosen & Habana

so

Mtawarira, Bissie, Jannie, Eben, Victor, Mahoje, Coetzee, Vermeulen, Reinach, Pollard, De Allende, De Villiers, Serfontein, Hendricks, Le Roux.

So the guys who will have started 4 games will be Eben, Victor, Coetzee, Vermeulen, De Villiers, Serfontein.

fa0019 wrote:Hmm, you have to wonder for those who will play 4 tests in the series. No rest for chaps like Vermeulen, Coetzee, Etzebeth, Matfield, De Villiers, Habana, Serfontein. Hopefully they can blitz Italy and bring on fresh subs quick. I would have preferred De Allende for the bench over Le Roux. Pietersen can play 15 and De Allende can play wing and both centre positions.

Wales at home is not a test anyone wants to play with 1 foot in the plan home.

They had more than enough rest . Although bit dissapointed Senatla or Mvovo didnt make the bench . Otherwise continuity is the name of the game , the core team must start every game with changes made were necessary that way in the event of injury replacement the team will function even if the replacement flops.

Agree, I am very disappointed that Senatla isn't there, I am very excited to see what he can bring to the team. I would have preferred him to Hendricks

fa0019 wrote:

SecretFly wrote:One test too many?

NZ 2012.

How many welsh will be barred from the match

Hibbard, James, Charteris, Davies, Phillips, Davies & Roberts

So that's their first choice 1,2, 12, 13 & 15.

So perhaps

Jenkins, A Hooker??, Lee, Ball, Jones, Lydiate, Warburton, Faletau, Webb, Bigger, A winger???, Williams, North, Cuthbert, Williams

The boks will be without Steenkamp, Botha, Burger, Pietersen, Goosen & Habana

so

Mtawarira, Bissie, Jannie, Eben, Victor, Mahoje, Coetzee, Vermeulen, Reinach, Pollard, De Allende, De Villiers, Serfontein, Hendricks, Le Roux.

So the guys who will have started 4 games will be Eben, Victor, Coetzee, Vermeulen, De Villiers, Serfontein.

fa,

In a weird twist all our French based players have been freed to play but the SA French based players haven't, don't know ins and outs but that's what's been reported. The only ones we will be with out are James and Hibbard which is bad enough as they are both first choice.

So as a side I guess we looking at :

Jenkins, Baldwin, Lee, Ball, Jones, Lydiate, Warburton, Faletau, Webb, Bigger, Cuthbert, Roberts, JD, North, Halfpenny

http://mobi.supersport.com/rugby/blogs/gavin-rich/Boks_would_benefit_from_riskier_selections

This was interesting and I agree. Tough job being Bok coach!

I agree it is a tough job MMaaxx, but think about it.

We have serious issues at wing.

Hendricks is a devastating finisher, but needs to work on his defence and has a serious problem under the high ball. Smart teams are going to exploit that.

JP Pietersen has lost his pace, defensively he is still good, but he has lost his mojo.

Habana is still world class, but he is inconsistent in his workrate theses days.

What other wing options do we have?

Why is Senatla, Cobus v Wyk, or anyone else not given a go?

Our best two tight heads of the SUper rugby season, Ruan Dreyer and Julian Redelinghuys should be playing this weekend.

DUane Vermeulen has no back up with experience?

Jean de Villiers and Jan Serfontein has played most of the season, who is their back ups?

Hi Bilt, sorry for the late reply. I agree that a bit more experimentation is needed. Perhaps if we had won the Ireland game there would be a bit more. Mainly giving one of the backup wings a game especially as Habana is not around for Wales and I'd look at giving JDV a rest as well as Vermeulan. Playing Matfield over Lood is also tough. The plan must be to win the game in the first half (easier said than done) and to bring on the subs early.

Come on Italy. You can win this.

score?

6-15
Lucky I had a sleep first and set the alarm. What's happened? SA not really interested and thoughts elsewhere?
Ah... that's more like it. Try to Habana now. 6-20 with conversion to come.

6-22 FT

Extremely frustrating match. Italy the master spoilers and SA still haven't learnt how to deal with it.

Slow pedantic game. What a waste

Couldn't see Italy scoring, so the game wasn't as interesting as the close scoreline at one stage suggested.

Yeah, but they slowed the ball down, the scrums down and Garces allowed them to lay all over the ball.

Rugby Fan wrote:Couldn't see Italy scoring, so the game wasn't as interesting as the close scoreline at one stage suggested.

Agreed. Thought at 6-8 they may have been able to kick themselves to victory. South Africa managed to break a couple of holes in the second half though and pull away with sone tries.

The Boks continue to lack composure and execution. Worryingly they looked tired to me today. Next week will be super tough.

They also seemed to be going through the motions when in possession as if doing a training drill like robots. Hardly coming from depth, at pace and on the angle. I put this down to over training and fatigue (to me England have the same problem, they play like a machine with little invention). Only when Willie came on did the Boks play with invention and spontaneity.

What does irritate me (and it is something that is becoming increasingly frequent) is that the rule book in matches where there is a significant difference between the teams often does not get applied to the weaker team. Italy today had a free for all at the ruck on attack and defence, an assumed scrum advantage, lives offside and a skew line out that never got penalised. They got away with murder the whole match and if the Boks put a finger wrong were blown up regularly. It happened to the Boks against Scotland in SA last season.

It keeps the weaker team in the match and playing in the hope of an intercept try and dodgy penalties. Of course it is the Boks fault for not taking scoring opportunities when they arise. As soon as they were ten points ahead it would have forced Italy to actually play rugby positively. If JPP had not butchered the try in the first 20m I predict the whole game would have felt very different.

MMaaxx wrote:The Boks continue to lack composure and execution. Worryingly they looked tired to me today. Next week will be super tough.

They also seemed to be going through the motions when in possession as if doing a training drill like robots. Hardly coming from depth, at pace and on the angle. I put this down to over training and fatigue (to me England have the same problem, they play like a machine with little invention). Only when Willie came on did the Boks play with invention and spontaneity.

What does irritate me (and it is something that is becoming increasingly frequent) is that the rule book in matches where there is a significant difference between the teams often does not get applied to the weaker team. Italy today had a free for all at the ruck on attack and defence, an assumed scrum advantage, lives offside and a skew line out that never got penalised. They got away with murder the whole match and if the Boks put a finger wrong were blown up regularly. It happened to the Boks against Scotland in SA last season.

It keeps the weaker team in the match and playing in the hope of an intercept try and dodgy penalties. Of course it is the Boks fault for not taking scoring opportunities when they arise. As soon as they were ten points ahead it would have forced Italy to actually play rugby positively. If JPP had not butchered the try in the first 20m I predict the whole game would have felt very different.

French ref surprise surprise . Then again Boks v Italy in Italy is always a scrappy affair not the free flowing one we all want to see . Going to be interesting against Wales though , Meyer will rue not giving the reserve wingers some gametime . I'm assuming JPP moving to 11 with Hendricks back in play . Also at flyhalf Lambie once again fails to cement himself as 10 which probably means Pollard getting his jersey back v Wales . Which isnt a bad thing as we can always count on the bench to make an impact and the more experienced Lambie in the last 20min is a positive.

Apparantly Meyer said both Lambie and Pollard will start in two matches.

Biltong wrote:Extremely frustrating match. Italy the master spoilers and SA still haven't learnt how to deal with it.

Slow pedantic game. What a waste

I think the final score shows that you dealt with it. You're lucky not to be on the wrong side of the score after playing down on their level, I've seen Wales lose in that manner before. We've got them sussed out nowadays though, as have SA.

After watching the Springboks fail yet again to negate spoil tactics it is clear that their tactics is still not up to par.

The list of matches against expected weaker teams that manage to stop us play at the breakdown is growing by the minute.

Since 2012 we have had a number of matches where we had no answer to teams intent on flooding the breakdown with any tactics available to them.

The list now includes, Argentina, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and after tonight Italy.

It seems as if teams are so aware of our inability to read how various referees handle the breakdown, and our inability to adapt that their main focus is now to frustrate our clean ball, slow the match down by any means necessary and the sad fact is they are succeeding.

Here is a list of the matches and the referees involved in these matches.

Argentina vs South Africa Mendoza 2012 – Steve Walsh

South Africa vs Scotland Nelspruit 2013 – Romain Poite

Argentina vs South Africa Mendoza 2013 – Steve Walsh

South Africa vs Wales Nelspruit 2014 – Steve Walsh

Argentina vs South Africa Salta 2014 – Steve Walsh

Ireland vs South Africa Dublin 2014 – Romain Poite

Italy vs South Africa Padova 2014 – Garces.

That suggests to me that there is a pattern, now what is understandable are the two French referees, but what does not make any sense is Steve Walsh, as South African Franchises play under Steve Walsh during the Super XV.

Naas Botha said something very telling in the post match discussion tonight, South Africa does not get the ball wide enough where there are less forwards to contest the ball in the contact areas who can spoil attacking ball and slow it down.

Nick Mallet in specific was not happy with the manner in which the breakdown was officiated, neither was I, but that doesn’t solve the issue as to why we cannot adapt to these spoiling tactics.

It is uncanny that teams have managed to irritate, dominate and spoil our breakdown ball especially when you consider we are supposed to be the most physical forward pack in general play in world rugby, or so I am told.

Are we truly that dense that we cannot figure out how to negate these tactics. Are we so dense that even though these teams play on the edge of the breakdown, we are the ones being penalised more often at the breakdown?

Are we that dense that we truly cannot read referees nor adapt to them?

Whatever the case may be, if Meyer and Richie Gray do not select the right players able to negate this issue, or coach our players a way to deal with this issue then we stand no chance of evolving our attacking play.

Talking of attacking play, without WIllie le Roux our attack is toothless and predictable. I fear for us when he gets injured.

The whole issue of our ineptness at the breakdown and on attack lies with our senior players not being able to adapt or run creative backline plays.

I do not know how many players we can blame for this, but it is definitely pathetic that we cannot fix this.

Watching the AUstralian back line attack tonight was an eye opener and made me realise that the only player in their backline that did not attempt an offload the whole evening was Adam Ashley Cooper, every other player managed to offload in contact.

WHat is also quite evident is that our forward runners have no support runners ready to take the offload, tonight a coupe of times our forward attempted to look for the offload but nobody was running off their shoulders in support.

Warthcing Ireland tonight was clear that they actually play the Bok gameplan of 2009, where they do not play from within their own half, they put many Gary Owens up, chase well and put Australia under enormous pressure.

The All Blacks after struggling to put Wales away in the first sixty, scored their first two tries to break the deadlock, from a chip kick and a cross kick.

South Africa has some work to do.

1. Adapt to the referee interpretations at the breakdown.

2. Adapt to what the opposition is doing at the breakdown.

3. If you can’t adapt, then push the contact areas wider where there are fewer opposition forwards.

4. Our tactical attacking kicking is non existent.

5. Our midfield does not pass.

6. When their is turnover ball, get the ball wide immediately.

There are probably a number of other things, but these are major areas of concern

I think 1 and 2 apply to NZ at the moment as well. 3's a bit of a variation, I'd say modify to game plan ensure ball retention and to get quick front foot ball for us.

Lack of support runners was an issue tonight but it is something SA never gets right regularly. Eben had a massive game and was often over the gainline looking to offload. Pity no one was around to support him.

I am so tired of hearing SA players going on about contact and physicality. It just shows the complete wrong mindset and a view that rugby is not about brains, speed and finding space. We still think that buldozing is the only way forward. Run at the space for @&£$ sake!!!

Hansen said just before they went on the'll try and put a couple of chips in behind them. 3 chips of various sorts in the 25...for 3 tries.

Biltong wrote:

MMaaxx wrote:Run at the space for @&£$ sake!!!

+1000

or chip into it...either way...don't leave it there unused. Thats what so many sides do...forsake all that lovely green pasture...

Ok...so it was the ref again. Amazing that it happens so often with the boks. Someone might even say you need to get off your high feicin horse . How dare the opposition try to compete with our beloved boks..Christ lads your as dull as the kiwis (worse really).

ME-109 wrote:Ok...so it was the ref again. Amazing that it happens so often with the boks. Someone might even say you need to get off your high feicin horse . How dare the opposition try to compete with our beloved boks..Christ lads your as dull as the kiwis (worse really).

Well done 5 star comment please do tell us more

http://www.espn.co.uk/scrum/rugby/story/248781.html

He was certainly a pain in our ass over the year's, but going to miss the big guy. Great player and one of the brutish characters in rugby. Part of the all time favourite Springbok back 5 too.

The Enforcer is Gone????


Just reading the bit where he says he was 'mulling' over it since 2011.  He takes a long time to think about things, does Bakkies!

ME-109 wrote:Ok...so it was the ref again. Amazing that it happens so often with the boks. Someone might even say you need to get off your high feicin horse . How dare the opposition try to compete with our beloved boks..Christ lads your as dull as the kiwis (worse really).

If that is what you want to take out of my comment, then fine.

BUt perhaps you should understand the context and then read the rest of it with an objective mind.

Biltong wrote:

ME-109 wrote:Ok...so it was the ref again. Amazing that it happens so often with the boks. Someone might even say you need to get off your high feicin horse . How dare the opposition try to compete with our beloved boks..Christ lads your as dull as the kiwis (worse really).

If that is what you want to take out of my comment, then fine.

BUt perhaps you should understand the context and then read the rest of it with an objective mind.

I think ME had a chemicalised sore head last night.