Ken Borland

The Lions are a really tough side to break down at home, so Bulls coach Jake White was understanding of his team’s problems in managing their attacking ball, and grateful that they didn’t just resort to terrible kicks straight down the field from their own half in their United Rugby Championship opener at Ellis Park at the weekend.

The Bulls eventually won comfortably enough, 31-15, but that scoreline does not reflect how competitive the Lions were. The scores were level at 15-15 with half-an-hour to go, and the Bulls needed a trio of Chris Smith penalties to keep the home side at bay, before a late maul try by replacement hooker Jan-Hendrik Wessels bumped up their score even further.

One could argue that the Bulls allowed the Lions back into the game through some ambitious game-management that saw them largely spurn kicking from the back. But White was pleased with the attacking intent shown by his new-look backline.

“I have no doubt the Lions targeted this game and we always knew it would be tough, it is always tough to win here,” White said after the match. “The Lions have their own style, they are a difficult side to break down and get rhythm on attack against.

“Our attack started well and the cohesion looked good enough, but as the game unfolded we left a few points out there. We conceded six penalties in the last eight minutes of the first half.

“In some cases we over-played, forced things, in our own half, but I don’t want them to just kick the ball down the field. I want us to feel comfortable keeping the ball.

“It was the first time this backline had played together and over time it will come right, the ability to transfer pressure into points, the understanding of the space at the back at times,” White said.

In any case, an away win when a team like Munster lost on the road and Leinster very nearly suffered an upset at lowly Zebre, will sooth any concerns White has.

“An away win is a massive bonus, you have to get a couple to do well in this competition. I enjoyed the way we showed composure.

“At 15-3 up you think you can let your hair down and play a bit, and then suddenly it’s 15-15 with 30 minutes to go. You don’t really want to bring your bench on when you’re up against it.

“But the bench came on, they were able to get cohesive, and they won that area this afternoon. You’re obviously not going to be that cohesive from Day One.

“But once we understand how to create pressure, wave-after-wave of it, then we can create that uncertainty in the opposition,” White said.

Following the announcement that Mark Boucher will be stepping down as Proteas coach after the T20 World Cup next month, it has emerged that the record-breaking wicketkeeper is lining up a lucrative Indian Premier League gig as the next step in his coaching career.

Boucher’s success with the South African T20 team – they are currently ranked third in the format – has attracted the attention of IPL franchises, who will also remember the stint he served as an assistant with the Kolkata Knight Riders in 2016.

It is believed though that Mumbai Indians are after his services to lead the Cape Town franchise in the new SA T20 competition early next year. This could provide Boucher with a stepping stone into becoming their coach for the IPL, which would be one of the best-paid jobs in cricket.

Mumbai finished 10^th and last in this year’s IPL under Mahela Jayawardene, a massively disappointing performance considering they won the tournament five times between 2013 and 2020.

CSA could announce an interim coach to take over from Boucher in the coming summer, before making a permanent appointment.

So who does South African cricket have who could take over the Proteas’ reins?

Robin Peterson

The spin-bowling all-rounder is probably the perfect candidate to succeed Boucher. Peterson has considerable international experience, having represented South Africa in 15 Tests, 79 ODIs and 21 T20s between 2002 and 2014. He has also done a wonderful job as coach of the Warriors, considering their limited resources, and they were pipped to the four-day title by the Northerns Titans last season. They are currently fourth in the overall Division One standings, ahead of teams like Western Province, KZN Dolphins and the Free State Knights.

Peterson also favours an extremely positive brand of cricket, his ability to empower the players being perfectly suited to the direction in which the modern game is going.

Malibongwe Maketa

The current owner of the SA A coaching job, the 41-year-old is next in line in terms of the pipeline. Maketa was also the assistant coach of the Proteas under Ottis Gibson from 2017-2019, but the outbreak of the Covid pandemic has meant the SA A team has hardly played in recent times and his coaching aspirations have been set back. But his tactical acumen and player management are both excellent. He represented Border in his playing days and is a former head coach of the Warriors.

Wandile Gwavu

Gwavu has enjoyed great success coaching the Lions and has won five trophies since 2019 when he took over from CSA’s current director of cricket, Enoch Nkwe, as head coach. And that will also be in his favour because he is almost a protégé of Nkwe’s and believes in the same principles of good structures and empowering the players. They are certainly on the same wavelength.

Counting against Gwavu is that he is still very young in coaching terms – just 35 years old – and he has no international experience.

Mandla Mashimbyi

Mashimbyi took over as Titans coach in the middle of the 2019/20 season when Boucher took over the Proteas role, managing to rebuild a team that dominated the second decade of the 21^st Century but was in need of new blood.

Leading Northerns to the four-day title last season, as well as runner-up finishes in both the white-ball tournaments, was an outstanding achievement with a new-look side.

But the 41-year-old would also be taking a step into the unknown at international level, having never been there before.

Kagiso Rabada, the top-scorer in a miserable Proteas total of 151, backed both the decision to bat first and the rest of the South African batting line-up to come good despite seven of them shuffling back down the aisle to the changeroom with just 92 runs on the board before he had to come to the crease on the first day of the second Test against England at Old Trafford.

Rabada scored a determined 36 to ensure the Proteas did not make some dreaded history on Thursday for beating their lowest ever completed innings in Manchester: the 130 they made back in 1929 when England beat them by an innings thanks to leg-spinner Tich Freeman’s career-best 12 wickets and centuries by Bob Wyatt and Frank Woolley.

Rabada then produced a top-class delivery, a back-of-a-length ball zipping and bouncing at the key England batsman, Joe Root, to find the edge of the bat and Sarel Erwee completing a juggling catch at first slip.

“We played two spinners for a reason and generally if you’re playing two spinners then you need to bat first. The pitch is getting drier and it’s quite slow.

“Simon Harmer is already in the game with his second ball ragging quite a bit. So I’ll say it is the right decision to bat first. We know the batting unit have quality but it is a young one as well.

“So it’s about gaining experience, but our batsmen know what they have to do, they don’t get out on purpose. They know what went wrong and as a team we back each and every player.

“Individuals take responsibility and I know they are all trying their utmost best. I’ll not be pointing fingers because that is just energy-sapping,” Rabada said.

Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad shared six wickets as they bowled with wonderful skill and nous to exploit the overcast conditions and a pitch that provided plenty of seam movement.

Rabada was asked about Anderson in the press conference at the end of the day’s play and he praised the paceman who is 40 years old and playing in his 174^th Test.

“Jimmy has had a remarkable career, particularly in Test cricket. He is still getting wickets and he is a legend of the game. He’s a phenomenal bowler, he showed that again today,” Rabada said.

“Only playing Tests has helped his longevity, but England play quite a few Tests every year. I guess I will need to have a beer with him at the end of the tour and ask him how he does it.”

Anderson has 661 wickets now halfway through his 174^th Test, a rate of 3.80 wickets per match. Rabada has 251 wickets in his 54^th Test, striking at 4.71 dismissals per game.

South Africa’s spearhead will need 140 Tests at this rate to post the same figures as Anderson, so 86 more. But given that the Proteas play so few Tests in comparison to England and are slated to play even less over the next few years, Rabada will need to keep playing until he is about 42 and show the same sort of longevity to overtake the numbers England’s leading wicket-taker is churning out.

An All Blacks side whose skills let them down in a Test match is certainly not the norm, and flyhalf Richie Mounga admitted on Monday that it was Springbok pressure that led to New Zealand’s error-strewn display in a 26-10 defeat at the Mbombela Stadium at the weekend.

South Africa produced an epic defensive display: their rush off the line, their scrambling and physical dominance of the gain-line; and their aerial mastery and an outstanding performance by the pack in the set-pieces were all too much for the All Blacks as the Springboks recorded their biggest winning margin over their greatest rivals since their 17-0 win in Durban in 1928.

“It was obviously very disappointing for us but it confirmed how good this South African team is,” Mounga said at their Sandton hotel on Monday. “They just build so much pressure.

“With their set-piece, coming round the corner and getting penalties, it just becomes an ongoing cycle that is really difficult to get out of. We’ll have to talk about how to counter that.

“It was just a matter of skill errors. You don’t have to be in the right frame of mind to catch the ball, to do your job or do the basics right. But not doing those put is in that cycle.

“It’s called a Test match for a reason because it will test your skill. It was tough to get around them, their high line put us under big pressure. The things we spoke about in order to combat that, we didn’t do well at all,” Mounga, who is likely to start at flyhalf on Saturday at Ellis Park because Beauden Barrett was injured in his collision with Kurt-Lee Arendse, said.

The classy Crusaders star said the All Blacks are trying to shut out all the outside noise, but he understands why their fans are up in arms.

“We know our fans can get frustrated with results and that is very fair, and it’s fair for them to care,” Mounga said. “We know that our performance was not good enough for All Blacks standard.

“But we don’t care what the fans think, I don’t really care what people think if they’re not in our squad. We are so close, but close is not good enough at this level.

“The Springboks’ game-plan is simple – they build numerous consecutive positive plays and that puts you under pressure. It takes just simple execution to change that.

“The most basic skills we couldn’t execute, but if we can fix that then we can start to put them under pressure. At the moment we’re frustrated because we’re making the same errors,” Mounga said.