Ken Borland

Heyneke Meyer, who built the Bulls team that has provided the foundation of the Springbok squad for the last eight years, was named as the new South Africa national coach in Cape Town on Friday.

The 44-year-old Meyer, who steered the Bulls to four Currie Cup titles between 2002 and 2006 and then their first Super 14 crown in 2007, has been appointed on a four-year contract.
“It’s truly humbling but also a huge honour and responsibility because the Springboks carry the hopes and dreams of the whole country,” Meyer said at a news conference in Cape Town on Friday. “I want to get the support of everyone behind the team and to do that I have to pick the best possible team. I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep, it would be easy to promise the world, but I need to plan very thoroughly.”

Former Leicester coach Meyer succeeds the controversial Peter de Villiers, who won a single Tri-Nations title and beat the British and Irish Lions in 2009 before guiding the Springboks to the quarterfinals of last year’s World Cup in New Zealand.
Meyer had initially been the favourite to succeed Jake White in 2008 when De Villiers was appointed, and he subsequently quit rugby before joining Leicester in June 2008.

South African Rugby Union (Saru) chief executive Jurie Roux said they had head-hunted Meyer this time around.

“This process started on June 9 last year and the timeline was set to today. We decided to head-hunt the Springbok coach because we knew exactly what we required. Our mandate was simple – to get the best coach to make the Springboks a winning team,” Roux said.
The qualified sports psychologist has been named by lock Victor Matfield, the most-capped Springbok, as the best coach he ever worked under.

Meyer is currently the rugby executive at the Bulls, but Roux said they had no option but to release him for the Springbok job.

“There is no breach of contract because Heyneke had a very definite exit clause for the appropriate position, which this obviously is,” Roux said.

Former Springbok and current Ireland forwards coach Gert Smal was thought to be the frontrunner to succeed De Villiers, but has recently signed an extension until 2013 to his contract with Ireland, leading to Saru’s seemingly rushed negotiations with the Bulls.

Meyer said that he believed it was his calling to eventually coach the Springboks.

“It’s been a long path with the Bulls, but we both realise there are bigger things. I believe that it is my calling to be the coach of the whole nation, not just one province.”

Meyer said that his first task would be to appoint his back-up staff, in consultation with Roux.

“It’s very important that we have the best people involved and a lot of them are in contract – if they aren’t it means that they’re probably not good enough. So there will have to be a lot of negotiation. The national coach shouldn’t have an ego and it would be arrogant for me just to rely on my own resources.”

Meyer said he will also be travelling around the franchises to learn about the character of the men he will be considering for the Springbok team and that it would be too early to name a captain in the wake of John Smit’s retirement.

“We have a very tough start against England, but I’m up for the challenge and we have brilliant players. There are only two types of rugby I know – winning rugby and losing rugby – and I prefer the first one.

“The World Cup is obviously very important to win, but I’m a big believer that whenever you’re on the field, you have to want to win.

“I’m not there to build a Springbok team, I’m there to win,” Meyer said.

England will be the new coach’s first opponents when they come to South Africa in June to play three tests.

South Africa took a lot of heat off themselves with their emphatic four-day victory over Sri Lanka in Cape Town, but in a way they merely added more fuel to the perceptions of the fans.

Led by Jacques Kallis, the greatest cricketer of the modern game, the Sri Lankans were blown away by 10 wickets, the quality of the performance matching the margin of victory.

And quality is the operative word.

Because that is the over-riding feature of a side that boasts the sort of talent throughout the line-up that should be the envy of the other nine Test-playing nations.

Other than perhaps an opening batsman’s berth, the number six position and the spinner, every post in the team is filled by a world-class, proven star, a challenger for a place in a World XI.

But their actual record as a team is another story.

A 208-run defeat by a Sri Lankan team that has perhaps half their talent in Durban in the previous test understandably caused immense frustration amongst the Proteas’ followers.

While captain Graeme Smith acknowledged the team’s continued failure to meet expectations at Kingsmead, he seemed surprised by the public reaction that has been partly quelled by their slick Newlands showing.

“Someone always seems to be on the chopping block, whether it’s Jacques having bad eyes or something else. But we haven’t lost too many Tests at home, we’ve just lacked a killer punch and Durban was again a big disappointment for us,” Smith said.

“That was a big wake-up call for the team because that was not the sort of performance expected of us. But there’s a lot to build on from this win and the way we won was the most important thing,” he said.

“We’ve played well at home, just not in Durban. It’s our job to turn that around. We just need to improve in Durban, but we haven’t had a great time in one-day cricket there either, so I think it’s a venue thing.”

Kallis celebrated his 150^th Test in style as he plundered a career-best 224 off the Sri Lankan attack, took three for 35 to wrap up their second innings and took a South African record-equalling six catches in the match.

“Newlands is always a special place to play for me, it’s always been my favourite ground. Even as a kid, I would come here to play, even when it’s empty it’s a special place.

“To play my 150^th Test here, to have the team’s victory and, from a personal point of view, to have the sort of performance you dream of – I couldn’t have asked for better,” Kallis said.

While Kallis shut up his critics in the most emphatic fashion, the vultures are still circling around wicketkeeper/batsman Mark Boucher’s head, although Smith had his back.

“There’s no problem with Boucher, it was the first time I’ve seen him drop a catch in ages. He took nearly 10 catches in Pretoria [eight in the first Test at Centurion] and everyone was raving about his performance. As a gloveman, he’s been excellent for us, ultra-reliable and I think that’s why such a fuss is being made about that one drop. When we go to England, having a reliable wicketkeeper will be crucial,” the captain said.