Ken Borland

Ahead of such major events as a British and Irish Lions tour, it is obligatory for all South African rugby fans to choose their Springbok squad to take on the tourists and, for me, just running through the list of players available makes me confident the hosts can turn the Lions’ roar into a meow.

Not that I am predicting a 3-0 whitewash by any means, I am sure all three Tests will be epic contests and a 2-1 margin is most likely. But the Springboks, providing they can reach Test match intensity quickly having not played at that level in over 18 months, can really hurt the Lions.

The superb Springbok pack that won the World Cup final, barring a couple of retirees, is still intact. And Jacques Nienaber is able to add players who have dominated their European opposition at club level, like Marcell Coetzee, Jasper Wiese, Rynhardt Elstadt and probably one of the Du Preez brothers (Dan or Jean-Luc), to that mix.

Set-piece prowess is going to be a big factor in the series and South Africa have wonderful back-up props and locks in Lizo Gqoboka, Trevor Nyakane, Ox Nche, Marvin Orie, Jason Jenkins and either JD Schickerling or Ruan Nortje. Imagine if Lood de Jager and RG Snyman were fit as well!

While South African rugby’s strength has traditionally been up front, it’s not as if the backline is going to concede tries like the Melbourne Rebels do. Plus they have some of the best attacking players in world rugby in their midst like Cheslin Kolbe, Makazole Mapimpi and Handre Pollard. In midfield, Damian de Allende and Lukhanyo Am are like the mailman, they always deliver, and Faf de Klerk is still a pain in the opposition’s butt.

And I am looking forward to some dazzling new international careers being born for the likes of Aphelele Fassi and Wandisile Simelane.

Apart from speed merchants Mapimpi and Kolbe, there is ‘toe’ aplenty in back-up wings Sbu Nkosi, Yaw Penxe, Raymond Rhule and utility back Damian Willemse.

I feel desperately sorry for the likes of De Jager, Snyman, Warrick Gelant and Sikhumbuzo Notshe, who did his knee three weeks ago, who will miss the series due to injury. It makes me even sadder that Cornal Hendricks, such an inspiring revelation at inside centre for the Bulls, is likely to miss out purely for off-field reasons relating to his legal action against SA Rugby over the handling of his heart condition.

I have sympathy for Nienaber and director of rugby Rassie Erasmus as they undertook the hellish task of choosing 45 players and breaking the hearts of several others. Who do you choose between Penxe and Madosh Tambwe? Even without Hendricks, does Andre Esterhuizen, so close to the 2019 World Cup squad, make it or do they recall Jan Serfontein?

What about Curwin Bosch? Does the squad need four flyhalves when you have the utility ability of Francois Steyn and Willemse?

Quality scrumhalves like Ivan van Zyl and Embrose Papier look set to miss out, while Jacques Vermeulen deserves a place for sheer tenacity, but is probably going to join one of the Du Preezs on the sidelines.

Even without De Jager and Snyman, there is probably only space for one of Schickerling and Nortje, and there are quality, in-form props like Carlu Sadie, Sti Sithole and Wilco Louw who will not get the nod.

Many of these players will just get to play in the one game against the Lions, for the SA A team in Cape Town on July 14, but they will forever have the experience of being in the Springbok camp, involved in the greatest series of them all, even if it is in a bio-bubble.

The squad will then be cut to 35-37 players depending on injuries, but in a hectic year for South African rugby, I’m sure many of those will be used in the team at some stage. There are going to be big squads chosen to sit in the bubbles in Australia and New Zealand for the Rugby Championship as well.

It is the nature of selection in a sport with such passionate provincial loyalties as rugby that everyone will have an individual player that they are adamant should have been in the squad. But these are the 45 men I would have in the Springbok squad (knowing full well that some of them are not going to be included):

Willie le Roux, Aphelele Fassi, Damian Willemse; Cheslin Kolbe, Raymond Rhule, Jan Serfontein; Lukhanyo Am, Jesse Kriel, Wandisile Simelane; Damian de Allende, Cornal Hendricks, Francois Steyn; Makazole Mapimpi, Sbu Nkosi, Yaw Penxe; Handre Pollard, Elton Jantjies, Morne Steyn; Faf de Klerk, Cobus Reinach, Ivan van Zyl; Duane Vermeulen, Marcell Coetzee, Jean-Luc du Preez; Pieter-Steph du Toit, Rynhardt Elstadt, Jasper Wiese; Siya Kolisi, Kwagga Smith, Marco van Staden; Franco Mostert, Marvin Orie, Ruan Nortje; Eben Etzebeth, Jason Jenkins; Frans Malherbe, Vincent Koch, Trevor Nyakane; Bongi Mbonambi, Malcolm Marx, Scarra Ntubeni; Steven Kitshoff, Lizo Gqoboka, Ox Nche, Thomas du Toit.

South Africa are disappointed to be 1-0 down going into the second T20 against Pakistan at the Wanderers on Monday, but they are still positive that they can turn things around, senior spinner Tabraiz Shamsi said on Sunday.

The four-wicket loss at the same venue in the first T20 was the Proteas’ second successive loss to Pakistan, after they were also beaten in the ODI decider. But, as Shamsi pointed out, both those defeats have come with South Africa fielding an inexperienced outfit missing seven first-choice players, while the tourists are pretty much at full strength.

“Obviously it’s not nice being 1-0 down but there are three more games and there’s no reason why we can’t win all three. The losses have been close games that could have gone either way, and the positive is that we are playing a young team while Pakistan have the strongest side they can put out. So we’re still quite positive, even though it still hurts whenever we lose.

“So we’re not happy, it’s not as if we are singing or dancing in the changeroom afterwards. But all the games have been close, we’re not losing by huge margins, so it means the guys coming in are performing up to international standard. It’s just small moments when we are not clicking, but that will come with playing together more, with more game time,” Shamsi said.

It’s fair to say that South Africa are not winning the big moments, which is a sign of inexperience. But it also means the senior players – the likes of Andile Phehlukwayo, Shamsi, Heinrich Klaasen and Beuran Hendricks – need to step up even more. Not that they are hugely experienced either, sharing just 95 caps between them.

“The current situation is that guys with 15-20 caps are senior players. But we all have to go out there and learn from these experiences. You do not learn these things from Playstation and sometimes you learn more from defeat. It’s always just one or two overs where we are slipping up, so we are not far off. It’s just about execution on the day and that can change quickly,” Shamsi said.

Pool A of the Momentum One-Day Cup in Potchefstroom effectively ended after just two matches, the rest being washed out, and the Imperial Lions will know the importance of their opening two games on Friday and Sunday with the currently good weather in the North-West set to turn next week.

The Lions play the Cape Cobras on Friday and then the Warriors on Sunday, and will be looking to follow the same route through to the semi-finals as the Dolphins did. The KwaZulu-Natalians won their first two matches against the Titans and Knights in convincing fashion and then sat back knowing they were safe as the rest of the fixtures could not be played due to regular showers and the outfield not being fit for play.

“It was a bit disappointing not to see a lot of cricket being played because of the weather, and hopefully the good weather now will hold out. Every game is important, bad weather or not, but it’s very important we hit the ground, up-and-running, from the start, we need a good performance from Game 1. We were fortunate we could play a couple of warm-up games at the Wanderers and we’re happy with the prep and where we are,” Lions captain Aaron Phangiso said on Thursday.

Pedigree alone suggests the Lions should join the defending champion Dolphins and Knights in the semi-finals. Phangiso’s men beat the Dolphins in their last round-robin fixture of last season’s Momentum One-Day Cup to finish second on the log. But the Natalians were awarded the trophy when the knockout rounds were cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, because they finished first in the standings, two points ahead of the Lions.

“We had a good season, we beat the Dolphins in our last match, but that is last season. But then again there has not been much cricket played lately, so we will take some confidence from that and our warm-up games. Potchefstroom is a second home for us, we know the conditions well, even though the pitch played completely different to what we are used to for Pool A.

“But we just have to adjust. The pitch is normally true and the ball comes through, but now the slower bowlers will definitely play a big role. We do have that in our attack with Bjorn Fortuin, myself and Malusi Siboto, we can all deliver in those conditions. Plus Sisanda Magala played for the Warriors before so he is used to those conditions and has given us one or two tips.

“Sisanda is going to be a big weapon for us in terms of tactics. The conditions would seem to favour the coastal teams because they play more often on slower pitches than us, but it’s just a matter of us adjusting and having better tactics. We have good enough players to deliver, and we have all played big cricket so we are experienced enough,” Phangiso said.

Lions squad: Reeza Hendricks, Dominic Hendricks, Ryan Rickelton, Kagiso Rapulana, Wesley Marshall, Delano Potgieter, Bjorn Fortuin, Sisanda Magala, Malusi Siboto, Eldred Hawken, Aaron Phangiso (cpt), Nicky van den Bergh, Johannes Diseko, Mitchell van Buuren, Tladi Bokako, Nono Pongolo.

SuperRugby is such a tough competition that every team at some stage will experience a crisis and it’s now the Stormers’ turn to face a test of character as to how they bounce back from their heavy defeat at the hands of the Crusaders in Christchurch.

The Stormers were fortunate to get out of jail a bit in their previous games with things like intercept tries from their own goal-line, but their luck ran out in Christchurch. Things they got away with in the first few weeks were punished by the Crusaders, who have a much more accurate passing game than most teams, and that exposed the Stormers. They struggled to deal with the width of the Crusaders’ game, they were up against a two-four-two set-up and the likes of Codie Taylor and Kieran Read in the tramlines proved too much for them.

The Stormers’ wings were continually being pressured by the poor defensive spacing on the inside; the main Stormers problem was their spacing around the ruck, there were too many players close to the breakdown inside their own 22. They need to get more players out wide, they were much too compressed in defence at the ruck. They were caught cold by the width of the Crusaders attack.

But for a lot of the Stormers players it was their first time in New Zealand and it takes some time to adjust. Plus the Crusaders are obviously on fire at the moment under new coach Scott Robertson and they were just too good for the Stormers.

I spent time with the Stormers in pre-season and coach Robbie Fleck is determined to play a hugely exciting brand of rugby, which has been successful, but now they’ve just hit a blip.

But the Stormers played quite well in the second half, with two of the Crusaders’ tries coming from intercepts, and they will draw some positivity from that. They obviously need to regroup against the Highlanders in Dunedin on Friday and having the roof closed will suit their game.

It was encouraging the way they came back against the Crusaders and now they are in Queenstown in a very pleasant part of the world where they can walk to training, so hopefully they will be in a better frame of mind come Friday.

It was a weekend of contrasting emotions with the excitement coming from the Southern Kings. For them to come through the way they did, for their forwards to play so well as they came back from 17-0 down after half-an-hour, and to win so convincingly really takes some doing. Plus any away win is super, so it really was a sensational result in Sydney, to win there without any Springboks (Waylon Murray being injured) was truly remarkable.

The Kings forwards certainly outmauled the Waratahs and the visitors took their chances, a charge-down try getting them back into the game. It was certainly a comprehensive win with the Waratahs scoring on the final hooter and one of their tries was also from an intercept.

The win shows that South Africa still has forwards that are well-drilled and marshalled and you have to credit coach Deon Davids. Sometimes on the third game on tour the players are thinking of going home, especially since you have to leave Sydney very early the next morning so you’re packing and getting ready for the game all at the same time!

You could tell how much it meant to the Kings players at the end of the game and it was the sort of win to resurrect some careers. Someone like Lionel Cronje has played at practically every union and although there is respect for his play, he hasn’t really fulfilled the promise of his SA U20 days. But time out of the game forced him to re-evaluate his priorities and he has come back a renewed guy.

The Lions against the Jaguares was a good game with Harold Vorster once again shining, the try he scored, running the same line as he did against the Stormers, got the home side back in the game.

The variety of plays the Lions have from five metres away from the tryline is impressive and it shows they want seven-pointers instead of three – they have front-peels, back-peels, shift-drives and normal drives.

It was also pleasing to see Elton Jantjies kicking a pressure goal. He’s certainly in the running to be the Springboks’ starting flyhalf, especially with both Handre Pollard and Pat Lambie injured at the moment, and it’s good to see him so composed.

Lionel Mapoe is also hitting some form and his dummy-and-go and finish for his try was first-class and he also put away Andries Coetzee for the final try.

So it will please Allister Coetzee to see those two coming back into form.

Two of the Tests against France will be on the Highveld so they will be quick games, with the Springboks also surely trying to up the pace because the matches are at the end of the French season and there will obviously be some tiredness. For that Allister should choose quick, Lions-type players – those Tests should really suit guys like Faf de Klerk, Elton Jantjies, Lionel Mapoe, Warren Whiteley and Jaco Kriel.

At the end of the day, the Lions are our flagship franchise and that should be reflected in selection.

The SuperRugby quarterfinals will probably be contested by four New Zealand teams, three from South Africa and one from Australia, so the likelihood is that the Lions will play a New Zealand side in the quarterfinal. So it’s important that they keep winning and now that they are overseas, they need to get on a roll. So it was good for them to come through the Jaguares game with a win.

The Hurricanes have still got to tour and the Crusaders are now in South Africa, so let’s hope the Cheetahs and Bulls can do something against them.

John McFarland is the assistant coach of the Kubota Spears in Japan and was the Springbok defence coach from 2012 through to the 2015 World Cup, where they conceded the least line-breaks in the tournament and an average of just one try per game. Before that, McFarland won three SuperRugby titles (2007, 09, 10) with the Bulls and five Currie Cup crowns with the Blue Bulls. In all, he won 28 trophies during his 12 years at Loftus Versfeld.