Rassie Erasmus – England are a ‘speedbump’ for South Africa ahead of semifinals،
PRESLES, France — South Africa’s director of rugby, Rassie Erasmus, has named the team he hopes England will field in Saturday’s Rugby World Cup semi-final and believes they have “beef ” with the Springboks after their defeat in the 2019 final.
Tuesday was a typically captivating press conference with Erasmus. It took place in a community hall in Presles, a town 30 kilometers north of Paris, and the Boks leader sat on a stage, framed by two red theater curtains with a spotlight trained on him. Erasmus has never been far from the rugby spotlight with a rich history of innovation and also mind games and he began his press conference by assessing the expected similarities between the two teams.
“It’s a huge hurdle to overcome,” Erasmus said. “I was looking at their possible squad and we play on average 200 minutes per player; them 216. Average caps in our team will be around 54; them around 59. Average age for us 30; them 29. Average weight 104 (kilograms ) against 105.”
When asked which England team he expects Borthwick to name on Friday, without missing a beat he replied: “Now we’re guessing, obviously. We’ve taken the basic guys – [Ellis] Gengé, [Jamie] George, [Kyle] Sinckler, [Maro] Itoje, [Ollie] Chessum, [Courtney] Laws, [Tom] Curry, [Ben] County, [Alex] Mitchell, [Owen] Farrell, [Elliot] Daly, [Manu] Tuilagi, [Joe] Walking, [Jonny] May, Marcus Smith or [Freddie] Steward, [Joe] Marler, [Dan] Cole, George [Martin] Billy [Vunipola] Ben Youngs or Danny, [Care] George Ford and Ollie [Lawrence]. That’s what we think, but we might be totally wrong.”
He then gave a detailed assessment of England’s threats and options: “First of all, it’s interesting to guess their team – Marcus [Smith], will he or Freddie play? Will Owen [Farrell] play inside the center with [Manu] Tuilagi outside where is going [George] Ford plays opener and drops everything there is to do there? They have Courtney [Lawes] who can play lock and flank, he has been such a rock for them on the flank and they have the energy of the other two young loose forwards. They bring energy to the field in all departments. They have Sinckler, Jamie and so many experienced players who played against us last time. I think because they played us at the end of last year and they played us in the Rugby World Cup final, I think they’re going to struggle with us. There are threats all over the park and it’s starting to come together for Borthwick.”
England were keen to play down any talk that this match would serve as revenge for their final defeat four years ago. They have a new coaching staff, but there are also many players in the team who participated in that final in Yokohama. “What I mean by [the beef]it’s just normal, we played them since the 2019 World Cup, we played them, I think it was Eddie’s last game.
“It’s something that always hurts when you lose the World Cup. When I was a player we lost the World Cup to Australia and in the next two games against Australia we were still thinking ‘ you took it away from us”, and England will feel like that, “you took it from us and we would like to take it back”. That’s the excitement.
“I don’t mean that in a negative way, I think that’s the way professional sports is, you want to solve problems, you want to make your country proud, you want to make your people proud, you want to make your team proud .and I think the English team will have to be like that, they won’t say ‘hey, come and do us again’, they will really fight until the end.”
The Springboks have provided plenty of intrigue at this World Cup. There was their traffic light system which they said was intended to communicate with support staff about the severity of injuries on the field. There was also their decision to go for a 7-1 split on the bench for their loss to Ireland – seven forwards, one back, which is an unconventional choice. On Sunday, in their quarter-final win over France, we saw winger Cheslin Kolbe attack a conversion attempt and the team also made the decision to call off a scrum.
Erasmus said there was little chance of them rolling out the 7-1 split to England. “It’s hard to be 7-1 with Handre [Pollard] and Mania [Libbok] ready now,” said Erasmus. “Give to Faf [de Klerk]and Handre starting together is obviously very tempting but having Willie [Le Roux] also in the 23 means having Damien Willemse on the 23 and he covers 10, 12 and 15 for you. So I think a 6-2 is more likely because you have two fully fit opening halves available and you need to have a nine on the bench, so I think a 7-1 is out of the question. “
Erasmus also said he would only name his team 48 hours before Saturday’s match because he wanted to see what England would do with their bench. He raised the possibility of changing half-backs, while hinting that Canan Moodie would have a role to play due to the way “England play”.
The Springboks go into Saturday’s match as favourites, but Erasmus is not prepared to listen to that noise. “I think there are three realities: there is the reality with English beef, there is the reality with what the world says – the media, the experts – and then there is our reality and the truth” , said Erasmus.
“The truth is that England didn’t lose a group match, they didn’t lose the quarter-final, they were in a building phase, they stuck to their guns, I don’t think that she had a lot of injuries.
“We would be stupid [to listen]we know we have a six day deadline, we traveled yesterday and I think they also have a six day deadline and we have to build a game.
If you look at the selections and the age, it’s exactly the same: they have 29/30, they have managed 216, we have 200 minutes per man. They are two fairly fresh teams, there are others teams in the 300/400 minutes and injuries in certain positions so no. We stay in our reality, in what we believe, what we analyze, the way we train and we certainly know that England will be tough too as possible.
