Ken Borland

For the Springboks to remain a top-class side, they have to be a flexible team with a capacity for thinking on their feet, coach Jacques Nienaber said on Friday as he outlined his vision ahead of his first assignments in charge against Georgia and the British and Irish Lions.

The world champions have not been in action since winning the World Cup in November 2019 meaning Nienaber, who was appointed as the successor to Rassie Erasmus in January last year, will oversee the Springboks for the first time when they warm up for the Lions series with two Tests against Georgia on July 2 and 9.

But with Erasmus, now the director of rugby, saying winning the series against the Lions will be like winning the World Cup, the focus is firmly on those three Tests between July 24 and August 7.

“The Lions have a well-balanced squad which can play both types of rugby. So that means we will have to be adaptable and solutions-driven during the match, and that’s how we are trying to coach. At the World Cup, during the knockout rounds, we had to play a certain style of rugby against Japan, moving them from side-to-side. It was about breaking down their style and imposing ours.

“Against Wales it was the complete opposite and then England posed something completely different in the final too. Part of the alignment camps has been about telling the players which are the critical areas of play that we need to get up to the required standard. We’ve been drip-feeding them bits of the game-plan as well,” Nienaber said on Friday.

While a series of such importance as the Lions playing the world champions is unlikely to produce sexy rugby, Erasmus said he does believe the tourists will have the ability to play quite expansively and at a high tempo.

“The players they have chosen won’t have any influence on our selection coming up next weekend, but if you look at the Lions squad, it’s fairly evenly spread between the four countries. Scotland have provided the most backline players, and Gregor Townsend [Scotland head coach] is the attack coach, while there are only three England backs. But the forwards are mostly from England and Wales.

“Most of the coaching staff have also worked with Warren Gatland before, Townsend is the only guy who hasn’t. I think they’re going to bring a mix, it won’t be like playing against Wales where whoever grinds the hardest wins. They have a fast, quick pack, just looking at their mobile props and if someone like Courtney Lawes plays at lock,” Erasmus said.

Bulls coach Jake White wants his team to be flexible and so he was satisfied that they were able to ‘win ugly’ in their opening Rainbow Cup match against the Lions at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday night.

White had before the game promised an attacking approach if conditions were dry, and the Bulls started superbly, keeping ball in hand for two minutes from the kickoff and then scoring the opening try. But thereafter they were constrained by a watertight, rapidly approaching Lions defence and the soft underfoot conditions, only managing to cross the tryline again in the 66^th and 80^th minutes for a 22-9 win.

The victory and a bonus point would also have been in the bag much earlier if the Bulls hadn’t had three tries disallowed due to captain’s referrals.

“Sometimes you’ve got to win these sort of games and we found a way to win. The Lions were very good at the breakdown, they tried to slow us down all the time. To have four tries disallowed – I think the yellow card for a deliberate knock-on could maybe have been a penalty try – was helluva frustrating because you keep thinking you’ve put a bit of distance between you and the opposition.

“But we know everyone will be coming for us because we’ve won the last two trophies and today we had to vasbyt for the win. We started so well and we were probably seduced a bit by that, the players maybe thought it was like a training run. But then the Lions had so many players in the line … if we had turned them around more with little kicks then we could have found a bit more space behind them,” White said after the Bulls’ 13^th successive win at home.

The Bulls dominated possession but at times they suffered from the rugby equivalent of bulimia – having an over-abundance of ball and generally keeping it in hand meant they also coughed up a lot of possession as the Lions dominated the breakdowns.

“We will work on not being sucked into playing too much rugby, sometimes we need to be a bit smarter. But we did end up playing into the wind in both halves because the wind turned … it was a bit extraordinary, something we’re not used to here. But it’s exciting times with guys like Elrigh Louw and Janko Swanepoel just out of the U21s, Mornay Smith is a young tighthead, Joe van Zyl, Stravino Jacobs and David Kriel are all young.

“But if you have too many youngsters then they can start to panic, so it’s nice for them to learn from the seniors exactly how to close off a game. I told the bench before the match that I was looking for composure at the end, for them to show maturity, and I was satisfied that they did. Lizo Gqoboka, Arno Botha and Morne Steyn are all Springboks, Jacques van Rooyen is very experienced, and it showed,” White said.

Geoff Toyana will give his Eagles team his usual shrewd strategic input before the game but the veteran coach knows that the nature of 3TCricket is such that that will only be the tip of the iceberg and captain AB de Villiers will need to be at his sharpest and most flexible if they are to win Saturday’s inaugural unveiling of the new format.

The country’s best 24 available cricketers will return to action in a SuperSport Park bio-bubble and the beloved game will return to our television screens on Saturday in a fundraising match for the cricket industry’s hardship fund. But it will be a version of the sport never seen before as three eight-member teams will battle it out at the same time, each batting for 12 overs in six-over blocks against each of their opponents.

The Eagles, Kingfishers and Kites will get their first sip of 3TCricket on Thursday when they play a practice match, but Toyana is already certain that captains will play the leading role. He has full confidence in his skipper, former Proteas captain De Villiers, who will lock horns with current national limited-overs captain Quinton de Kock (Kites) and ace fast bowler Kagiso Rabada (Kingfishers).

“It’s something new for all of us and we are still finding our strategy, tomorrow [Thursday] is the perfect opportunity to test things out and also sharpen up on the rules. There’s not just one opponent to worry about now but two and you need to be smart in terms of who bowls against who, each bowler only gets three overs, so do you bowl say Lungi Ngidi for two overs against the first team or against the second side?

“There are going to be headaches like that and the last man stands rule in batting is also very exciting. I think the captain is going to be the big player and he needs to get his tactics spot-on. He’ll have to really think on his feet, but fortunately AB is really positive and passionate about this. And he’s hitting the ball extremely well, as good as I’ve ever seen him hit it in fact,” Toyana told The Citizen on Wednesday.

While the Covid-19 restrictions will rob the match of some of its joy, Toyana said the players are all delighted to be playing cricket again.

“It’s just a really good thing to be back on the field again, the sun’s shining and we had really good training. Rassie van der Dussen is also looking good although he keeps wanting to bowl, Andile Phehlukwayo had a good hit too and Bjorn Fortuin was in his element. Lungi Ngidi and Junior Dala have been hard at work here at the Titans for the last two weeks and they are very excited too.

“We will have to observe social distancing of course and there are some strange red lines on the field. Plus the players all use their own balls, which makes it tricky for the coach because you hit one to a player and he ignores it because it’s not his ball! But these are tough times, it’s a charitable cause and the guys all just want to help out,” Toyana said.

Originally, Proteas white-ball spinner Tabraiz Shamsi was the only slow bowler named in the squads, but Highveld Lions star Bjorn Fortuin has subsequently replaced Sisanda Magala, who has pulled out due to a family bereavement. Judging by how spinners were fatally under-rated when T20 first came along, not having a frontline spinner could hurt the chances of the Kites, although Jon-Jon Smuts is far from a part-timer.

“I think this game will be good for spinners as well and I’m glad we’ve got one. And Bjorn is one of the best in the country at controlling the field, we could even use him up front against certain batsmen,” Toyana said.