Ken Borland

The timing of the serious knee injury suffered by Bulls flyhalf Johan Goosen was so frustrating that it would be little wonder if Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber was pulling the hair out of the top of his head. If he had any there of course.

The 29-year-old Goosen has played 13 Tests for the Springboks, the last in 2016, and he said on Wednesday that he is hopeful of getting back there. Since being encouraged back into rugby at the Bulls, his exceptional displays last year saw him set to return to the international fold, before he tore his ACL ligament last October. But he is clearly in Nienaber’s long-term 2023 World Cup plans.

“The rehab is going well but I still have two-to-three months to go before I can get on the pitch and train again,” Goosen, who was walking unaided, said at a Castle Lager media launch in Tembisa on Wednesday.

“It’s been tough mentally and I had to have a second surgery about two months ago because something was loose in the knee, so that was the 11^th operation of my career, so I’m used to it.

“Coming back to South Africa, I played well enough that I really thought I had a chance at the Springboks, so I was sad to get injured. But Jacques Nienaber did phone me and ask if I still wanted to play for the Boks.

“I’ve been at the two alignment camps this year and from being a little boy, I just wanted to play in a World Cup. In 2015, Heyneke Meyer said I was going and then didn’t pick me, and in 2019 I had stuff going on off the field,” Goosen said, referring to his controversial retirement from the game.

It really does seem like the experienced flyhalf’s deepest desire is indeed to return to the Springbok squad for next year’s World Cup and, if all goes well and he is back playing in September, then there is plenty of time to earn his recall. There may not be any Currie Cup for him to use to ease back into action though, and it will be straight back into Europe for the former France-based player.

“My new goal is to work really hard and make the World Cup squad. I’m targeting a return in the United Rugby Championship, and hopefully I will just miss the first two or three matches.

“It’s going to be tough in Europe next season because there’s the Champions Cup as well. I played in the Challenge Cup final and even that is a level up from the URC,” Goosen said.

Enoch Nkwe says there will always be a part of him that will hanker after the excitement of on-field, hands-on coaching, but for now the former Proteas assistant coach sees his future as being in more strategic ways, setting up systems for teams.

The Central Gauteng Lions announced this week that Nkwe was returning to them as their Strategic Cricket Consultant for March and April. It is a short-term gig, but at least the coach who took the Lions to three franchise trophies in 2018/19 is back in the system.

But what will the 39-year-old be doing after that? Does he have his eye on the Technical Director position rumoured to be in the process of being created by Cricket South Africa? Or will he aim even higher and go for the Director of Cricket post because Graeme Smith’s contract concludes at the end of this month and the position will be readvertised.

“There will always be a part of me that enjoys the on-field coaching,” Nkwe told The Citizen at his unveiling at the Wanderers on Wednesday, “but I’ve made peace with the technical aspect of coaching, having done it through from U19s and Academy level to the Proteas.

“There are different ways of coaching and I’ve always been very strategic in my approach. I like setting up systems and I’m a big believer that for your main team to be successful, they need a well-aligned system beneath them.

“The Lions have offered me a great opportunity to step into that direction and we’ll see how far we get to or if I am led into a different space.

“My passion is driving systems and entrenching new ways of playing the game. I’m always open to opportunities, but it needs to speak my language, I need to fit in,” Nkwe said.

Having experienced life at international level and enjoyed tremendous success domestically, Nkwe would seem to be an excellent asset for CSA to keep involved. Despite his unhappy departure from the Proteas, Nkwe did not rule out working for the national body again.

“As a cricketer or as a coach, if you get an opportunity to make a difference to the national system then you would certainly look at that.

“If it makes sense to me and if it fits me, then I would be willing to realign my plan to take things forward at national level,” Nkwe said.

While there would have been some joyous relief for the South African team not to have to play powerhouses Netherlands or India, their FIH Hockey Pro League match against France in Potchefstroom on Tuesday night still ended in defeat as they went down 4-1.

While France are ranked just two places above South Africa in 12^th on the world rankings, they are arguably the most improved side in the game in recent years. So the good news for the embattled South Africans is that they matched France in the middle of the field, but it was in the circles where the European side were just way more clinical.

France went 2-0 up in the first 10 minutes through two deflection goals, but South Africa had also looked threatening, no more so when Bili Ntuli’s reverse-sticks shot came off the post after Bradley Sherwood, who was an encouraging addition to the side, robbed a defender of possession.

The hosts then held France scoreless in the second quarter and were creating enough opportunities for them to feel they could yet njotch their first Pro League win.

But France were just too clinical in the second half, making full use of the opportunities they had. In the 41^st minute, they pounced on one loose pass by South Africa, racing down the right of the field before crossing to the middle, where Gaspard Baumgartner finished the move for his second goal.

France went 4-0 up in the 54^th minute through similar ruthlessness on the counter-attack. A quick overhead from a free hit found an attacker on the edge of the circle, he put in the cross, which was missed by an SA defender, allowing Timothee Clement to score.

It was also a feature of the match that France’s defence remained impressively composed and solid, while South Africa’s tended to make costly basic mistakes every now and then.

South Africa did, however, get on the scoreboard with three minutes remaining when the Cassiem brothers, Mustapha and Dayaan, combined superbly for Dayaan to put the chance away. He had hit the crossbar just a minute earlier when Mustapha had also been the provider.

The decision by the Bulls to field top players like Bismarck du Plessis, Marcell Coetzee, Morne Steyn, Harold Vorster and Lionel Mapoe in the Currie Cup loans some credibility to the competition, but truth be told, there can be little doubt that the famous old tournament is now on its last legs.

Of course it helps the Bulls that they have deep pockets thanks to the generous investment of their equity partners. But they should not be criticised for being professional and organised enough to attract those investments and also recognising the need to significantly improve the depth of their squad now that they are playing in two competitions at the same time.

The fact that they have been willing to field a number of players who will feature in Saturday’s URC derby against the Stormers shows that they, at least, are taking the Currie Cup seriously, unlike so many in South African rugby.

The Sharks are probably in an even better position financially, but they made a slow start to the Currie Cup by beating Griquas by just one point in Durban. But conditions – hot and humid and then raining – were definitely a levelling factor and the Sharks were not helped by having to play the final quarter with 14 men due to a red card. But even with all their riches – both in personnel and in finances – the Sharks only fielded one Springbok in 33-year-old prop Lourens Adriaanse.

The Bulls being 40-0 up against archrivals Western Province at Newlands and the Pumas putting fifty past the Lions at Ellis Park does little for the credibility of the Currie Cup.

Little wonder then that the public response has been muted. If SA Rugby is barely interested in the Currie Cup, why should spectators pay good money to support it? The Currie Cup, from being South African rugby’s second biggest brand after the Springboks, is now so devalued and the public are not going to be fooled by all the hype when there is little substance.

Some people do enjoy rugby more from the aesthetic of plenty of tries being scored and this mishmash Currie Cup will probably provide that. But even the Bulls are unlikely to use their top players in it once the United Rugby Championship gets into full swing.

SA Rugby find themselves with a problem because the URC hasn’t captured the public imagination yet like SuperRugby did in the early days. In that regard Covid has obviously not helped, neither have the poor performances of the South African franchises overseas.

But a disjointed, lopsided competition – Jake White made the point that Saturday’s game at Loftus Versfeld is the Bulls’ first at home in the URC, which started on September 24 – now also has its waters further muddied by the Currie Cup taking place at the same time.

I would call it an absolute howler by SA Rugby but there are some extenuating circumstances in their defence.

First of all, it is the provinces who have said they want a double-round of Currie Cup, which then becomes a challenge to fit into an already crowded calendar. Player workload concerns are also a factor, with URC starting in January and running through to June 18, after which there is the Test window.

But the last time a normal Currie Cup season was played in a double round, it began on June 18 and ended on September 11. I would still play the Currie Cup after the URC. Sure, the current Springboks would not play, but when last did they feature in a proper Currie Cup anyway?

At the moment, this most famous of domestic competitions has been reduced to Vodacom Cup status.