Boks’ rot comes from the top

Peter de Villiers took a break from his press duties on Friday morning in downtown Wellington and, in fairness to the guy, he was due a rest. For the longest time now, the Springbok coach has been battered by questions, not just about his idiosyncratic public utterances, but mostly about his strange team selections and his stubborn refusal to see the home truths that are staring him in the face.

While De Villiers was mopping his own brow ahead of their second game of the tournament (against Fiji this morning, UK time), no doubt suffering palpitations at the prospect of facing Samoa next week, the job of calming the fears of a nation fell to his assistant, Gary Gold. But Gold was in no mood to soft-soap.

“Relief,” he said when asked about the closest of close shaves last Sunday night against the Welsh. “Yes, I don’t think there was any other emotion that could properly describe the feeling other than relief. We have to be honest enough to admit that we got lucky.

“When we were 16-10 down and Jamie Roberts had that break in midfield I thought it was going to be all over. If they’d scored again we’d have been in heaps of trouble. We have to say it; we were lucky.

“Honesty is a big part of rugby and we accept that we are in a very, very tough group and we accept also that teams like Fiji and Samoa can beat us. I’m not just saying that to be nice. It’s genuinely a concern because if you look at Samoa, they went down to Australia not that long ago and genuinely beat them. Australia didn’t have Will Genia and Quade Cooper, but, otherwise, they had nearly everybody playing. That was not a Mickey Mouse Australian side that Samoa beat, so if they can go and do a job on Australia then they’re definitely going to believe that they can beat us.”

They surely won’t, but there was no doubting Gold’s sincerity all the same. There was no mistaking his concern about a growing Springbok injury list either. Victor Matfield, the totem of their pack, was unavailable for the Fiji game, as was Jean de Villiers, their defensive rock in the midfield, and Bryan Habana. Johann Muller, the Ulster lock, was also missing. Bakkies Botha played, but the story was that he wasn’t 100 per cent ready. “I’m not sure if there’s something in the water, but we’ve got a few injuries at the moment,” said Gold.

Of course, they’ve also got plenty of brilliance and a relatively secure passage to the semi-finals, should they meet Ireland in the quarters as they’re seeded to do. Nobody, though, would bank on them going any further than that on current form.

Jaque Fourie, World Cup-winning centre and third highest try-scorer in his country’s history, was asked about the vibe around this World Cup and how it differs from four years ago, when South Africa were dominant. Fourie paused for a second and said, “Well, the weather’s not very nice here”, but beyond that, he didn’t see a great deal of change between France 2007 and New Zealand 2011.

Fourie is no more of a fool than Gold. He knows that things have changed but, understandably, doesn’t want to admit it publicly. This Springbok squad have been trying to douse the flames that Wales lit under them last weekend and, just like their performance over Warren Gatland’s team, their game of crisis management is unconvincing.

“I haven’t seen anything in this World Cup that scares me,” said Fourie. “There’s a lot of experience in our team and the way we came back against Wales just showed that. We didn’t panic, we said there’s still time left, let’s build the phases, keep the ball and eventually the try will come – and it did. It’s great to have all that experience around you and I’m sure it will take us a long way.”

In his heart of hearts, though, Fourie must know that his captain, John Smit, is a sad shadow of what he was in France, must know that Matfield and Botha, immense for so long, are both struggling with injury and the passing of time. He must know that Habana, once ruthless, has not scored in his last eleven Tests and must also know that one of the great scrum-halves of the modern game, Fourie du Preez, is not carrying anything like the same authority he had in the past.

South Africa, not flash but utterly self-assured four years ago, have issues in so many different areas of the field right now, either through injury or loss of form or through the madcap thought process of the coach. The continued preference of Smit over the outstanding Bismarck du Plessis and the ludicrous selection of Morne Steyn at fly-half cuts to heart of the matter for South Africa.

This is what De Villiers had to say after the Welsh game on the subject of his first-choice 10. “Defence has become an art. So if we can get the right brand that will force teams into mistakes and get our mighty boot [Morne Steyn] to nail them, it will be the right way to go. With Morne in the side we force teams to kick more, because they won’t want us to play in their territory [for fear of conceding kickable penalties], and the more they kick the more we can dictate the game.”

This flies in the face of reality. Wales ran straight at Steyn and Steyn wasn’t able to deal with them. Sure, he’s got a kick like a mule, but every centre in the Roberts mould would relish a crack at him. The problem, of course, is that Butch James, the other viable fly-half, wasn’t available for selection against Fiji because of a hip knock. De Villiers might not have picked him even if he was fit.

Smit is the big conundrum. A great leader, a terrific warrior, but no longer a great player and hasn’t been for a year and more. Of the last ten Tests that Smit has started at hooker the Springboks have, remarkably, lost eight of them – and one of the Tests he won, against Wales last weekend, was only achieved after he left the field and allowed Du Plessis to galvanise the team. Du Plessis was quite brilliant in his minutes on the park against the Welsh.

You can’t pin all of this to Smit, but it is too much of a coincidence that he has won only two of his last ten starts while Du Plessis has won eight of his last ten. De Villiers ignores the evidence as a mark of respect to Smit and all he has done for the Springboks. It’s respectful but it’s a misplaced loyalty.

South Africa have too many thunderous players to be halted before the semi-finals, but their prospects thereafter might depend as much on what is going on between the coach’s ears as what is happening in the Test match arena.

“We’ve been in tight spots before and we’ve pulled through,” said Fourie on Friday, but that was four years ago when they were younger and playing better and when they had the canniness of Jake White as coach rather than the unpredictability of De Villiers. The weather is not the only thing that’s changed since France four years ago.