Bryan Habana: 'Rassie is fair while being harsh in many instances'

So much has changed in the five years since this writer sat down for a RugbyPass one-to-one interview with the legendary Bryan Habana. The Springboks have become back-to-back Rugby World Cup champions, while the former winger is now thriving in his transition from retiring as a player to forging a new career in business and rugby punditry.

One constant throughout the five-year interlude, though, is the continuing drift at Manchester United. With the news having just broken a few hours before that Erik Ten Hag has become their latest manager to be handed his P45, football – not rugby – was an obvious place to start the conversation given how Habana owes his name to legendary Red Devils from the past.

“I’m probably a fair-weather Manchester United fan, although I was named after Bryan Robson and Gary Bailey,” he chuckled. “The writing was on the wall for a very long time. The loss against West Ham wasn’t ideal. It does feel like there wasn’t real synergy in where he was going and even though he did win a few trophies for the club, it just seemed like there was misalignment.

“Rebuilding is never easy but the powers that be felt that a change is needed and hopefully whatever change, because I do think the pickings are slim from a managerial perspective, particularly at this time of the season, it is for the better. It’s onwards and upwards and if anything a resurrection of the love that so many of us have for Manchester United.”

Enough about that flirtation. What about Habana’s true sporting love, the Springboks? He wore the shirt in 124 Test games, including the 2007 Rugby World Cup final win in Parus over England. Since his retirement, two more World Cups have been won and with Rassie Erasmus back at the helm as head coach this year, they have added The Rugby Championship title to their collection and introduced fans to a host of new Test-level stars.

“Easily, as a collective, it’s the best the Springboks have ever seen. What this team has achieved over the last five years is historic from a South African rugby perspective,” he enthused about a golden era not thought possible following the decline under Allister Coetzee.

“As a proud South African supporter – I’m a former player and now very much like every other South African that supports the Springboks – how this very much transformed team speaks and represents all of South Africa is phenomenal.

“The depth that Rassie has created over the last six years is just incredible. You have double World Cup winners in Faf de Klerk, Trevor Nyakane who aren’t even in the squad. They would be disappointed with the loss against Ireland at home in July but double World Cup winners winning the first full Rugby Championship since 2009, they are irrepressible in what they are achieving as a group and will go down in the history books as probably one of the best groups to have played the game.”

Which of the rookies has especially caught Habana’s eye in recent months? ‘There is always the question of who will go to the next World Cup and in this cycle, we have seen an insight into what Rassie is bringing about.

“You look at someone like Pieter-Steph du Toit, who has been monumental this season. If he isn’t up there with the top two best players in the world, I’m not sure who would be. And seeing the old guard, the likes of a Cheslin Kolbe, performing without injury.

“But then seeing the unearthing of young talent, someone like Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu who made his debut. Unfortunately injured for the Autumn Nations Series but he has created a lot of excitement. Aphelele Fassi keeping out a veteran double World Cup winner in Willie le Roux. He is playing some brilliant rugby and that has highlighted the depth that South African rugby has got.

“Rassie has brought in Jerry Flannery, Tony Brown and the impact in the Springboks’ game play is very comparative to the effort put in off the park to create a brand of rugby that we are using different areas of the pitch to attack from, keeping our flankers out wide. And how we back Manie Libbok after a pretty disappointing end to a game was really great.

“Rassie is one of the most innovative coaches out there and has created a wealth of excitement where you think players were ageing, players weren’t possibly going to be around for 2027 and all of a sudden, the manner that Rassie has reinvigorated their energy and passion seems that it is a possibility and giving their best shot at trying to go three in a row in three years.”

Habana has relished the older guard taking younger players under their wing without a fuss. ‘What has been phenomenal to see from the outside is how the old guard have embraced a young group of players and allowed them to flourish.

“There is an incredibly strong core group of leadership but young voices are allowed to be heard at the top of the table and in so doing everyone understands what their accountability is when you wear that Springbok jersey.

“Rassie has been fair while being harsh in many instances. I look at someone like Willie le Roux, who is sitting on 98 Test caps. Rassie could have easily played him against any of Argentina, Australia, New Zealand to get him to that 100th cap in South Africa.

“He is still part of the group but every player, it might be harsh but Rassie has always looked at what is the best for the Springbok team and there has definitely been an uptake of accountability where Rassie has been a strong stakeholder in making all of that team understand while also to his credit acknowledging where he sometimes faltered, how the whole situation with referees came about a few years ago.

“Yes, he is innovative, yes he adapts and thinks outside the box but he is also willing to put his hand up and that has played a big part in someone like Jaco Peyper being pulled in. Rassie understood he maybe didn’t do things as they should have been done. He is an innovative thinker but someone that has made every player understand what they need to do to buy in. The greater good of the team is always the priority.”

That approach is of immense importance in continuing to make the Springboks a team fully representative of the diverse South Africa. It was September when Habana posted a Heritage Day video on X where a native South African who spent his life supporting the All Blacks has changed allegiance because of what the Springboks now represent.

“It's really difficult to let people who don’t understand know how unique a history we have in South Africa, how infrastructurally our country is unfortunately set up in such a way which 60 to 70 per cent probably don’t have equal and fair opportunities because of what the past represented.

“If you live in an underprivileged area and you are trying to get to good schools or the right support, developmentally to reach the echelons of Springboks rugby is exceedingly challenging but this current Springbok team, which is purely based on merit, is extremely transformative.

“When I was inspired to pick up the game in ’95, you only had the late Chester Williams as a representative of 80 per cent of our population. Now you look at that team, you go through those names that are there and it’s just phenomenal to see how far our country has come.

“When you see that clip that I shared of a person who believed the only support that he could give was that of the All Blacks purely because of our unique political history yet he is South African, for him to change allegiance because of what this team is doing and how they truly speak to the whole of South Africa, not to one specific race, it’s absolutely phenomenal.

“I didn’t grow up with the likes of the challenges that Siya Kolisi, Makazole Mapimpi faced. I had the best opportunities in life to succeed and thankfully because of my upbringing and my parents’ support, if I didn’t make a success of my life it would be my own wrongdoing.

“When I was winning a World Cup in ’07, Siya was watching in a shebeen in the Eastern Cape because his grandmother couldn’t afford DStv. His father was non-present in his environment. For him to get inspired and play the game and truly speak to those on the outskirts is phenomenal.

“Rassie has really put the mantra forward of letting the players currently involved in this Springboks squad understand firstly who they are, what their unique diversity brings to that team, but how collectively that diversity has to play a part in giving our country back hope and sparking inspiration.

“If you don’t come from South Africa, don’t fly into Cape Town over our squatter camps and see the massive differential, it’s really difficult to understand the emotions that boil your blood because when you run out on that field in the Springbok jersey you are representing the whole of South Africa, you don’t want to feel like you are only representing a portion.

“You run out there wanting to represent the whole of South Africa, representing a South Africa that the late great Nelson Mandela fought for when we became a democratic country in ’94. It’s sometimes really difficult (to explain) and yes, the emotions flare and rise but to see the emotion of such magnitude that I shared on social media a few weeks ago was really cool.”

It was from the Eastern Cape where Habana spoke with RugbyPass in 2019, doing some promotional work for Land Rover ahead of that year’s World Cup in Japan. A year after retiring as a player, he was unsure of his rugby afterlife, admitting that nothing was set in stone and that his future was uncertain.

Now 41 and in the UK to provide punditry for TNT Sports’ coverage of the Autumn Nations Series, he is in a much happier spot having made a good fist of his post-playing transition. “I saw a piece by Thierry Henry this morning around the transition for any professional athlete, not just a rugby player, you have a mini death,” he explained.

“The biggest thing that resonated in the clip I saw, he said you go home and you are a stranger because you got used to being in this high-performance environment and your family became accustomed to that and now you almost have to re-court your wife, reintroduce yourself to the kids.

“For me, the transition, I have been extremely fortunate and privileged. I started a fintech company called Paymemow and I have been very fortunate to be in certain ambassador roles, to be in punditry. I have managed to get into a routine of a corporate life, growing a company from four guys in a garage to 52 full-time staff processing just over 640,000 transactions a month, it’s been pretty cool.

“Trying to find out who you are and finding that purpose, in 2019 I definitely didn’t have an idea and when my university roommate (Deon Nobrega) approached me with this Paymemow concept, I latched onto it. It’s been a challenging six years in trying to learn because a 16- to 20-year rugby CV doesn’t mean much in business if you can’t bring in sale or grow the bottom line and grow profit.

“But I have been very fortunate in understanding how many struggle. The stats out there are alarming in terms of those moving on to the next chapter of their lives. Six years in, I am pretty happy and comfortable to say I have been fortunate to move on.

“Yes, I miss the game but also knowing given my current physical physique, I wouldn’t be able to mix it up in Varsity Cup let alone at the highest level. I look at the physical intensity that these players currently put into playing, I’m so grateful for where I currently am.”

Helping his punditry this month will be the smart ball equipped with Sportable technology and powered by Sage, which provides data on every second of a match. ‘There is a bit of envy with the technological advances that the game has seen since I retired,” he admitted. “The smart ball is definitely one of those.

“As the technology continually improves and the margins for error become a lot less and a lot more accurate in terms of the data received, the overall product of rugby becomes so much better. As a winger, I probably had one of the best in the game from a hang time perspective in Fourie du Preez kicking the ball for me. But to be able to give that insight to the audience, for them to be able to understand how much of an impact stats and data make on the outcome of a game becomes critical.

“Being able to use it conversationally alongside co-comms, third comms, pitchside reporting, it just brings a different element to the game. Hopefully the audience gets to hear it, gets to see it, gets to play around with it and really understand what an important, critical component of the game stats and data are.”

• Sage is the Official Insights Partner of the Autumn Nations Series 2024 and sponsor of the smart ball, driving innovation in rugby through the power of data. For more information, visit www.sage.com/rugby