'It's something I just grew up with, I've no idea where it comes from'

Benhard Janse van Rensburg will have enjoyed the Saturday night bus ride home with London Irish. The deserved win over Bath gave the team a huge leg up in the Gallagher Premiership table in the race for the playoffs and there was sure to be the usual craic as they wound their way along the M4.

The South African didn’t travel down with them on Saturday morning. He and a few others at the Exiles prefer to get these journeys done earlier than game day. “It’s different from person to person,” he explained on Friday afternoon to RugbyPass before hitting the road west towards The Rec where he was a 59th-minute try-scorer in the 25-10 victory.

“Some people enjoy spending the night before the game with their families and they don’t mind sitting on the bus the next day before the game. I’m just a little bit used to trying to stay as close as possible to the game the next day so that I don’t have to spend those two-and-a-half hours on the bus before a game.

“Then I don’t have to wake up that early in the morning. I can just be calm and stretch my legs a little bit before the game. But if we get a win on an away trip like that, the bus ride back is always fun. (Agustin) Creevy normally takes over the speaker, plays some Argentinian songs and the playlist he has. Then after an hour, he will just open the floor for everyone that has requests.”

It was the summer of 2021 when the now 26-year-old first arrived at London Irish after a Japanese pitstop at the Green Rockets Tokatsu. Corniel van Zyl was the conduit. Having worked with van Rensburg at the Cheetahs, he put a good word in at the Exiles and the match-up has been idyllic.

Saturday was van Rensburg’s 48th appearance and he went into it as the Gallagher Premiership’s player of the month for January. Good going, especially when you consider his December faux-pax of somehow standing on a knife at home and inflicting a five-stitch wound. He just loves playing for the club.

“It’s the type of rugby, the exciting brand, it makes it so enjoyable. The attacking rugby, the attacking mindset, that is the type of rugby I love playing. Any young guy that comes to Irish and fits into their style of rugby will enjoy it here.

“We always have a go. Tight game, loose game, 30 points ahead, 30 points behind, we will always have a go. We score some amazing tries and have some amazing young lads. It makes it so exciting. To have someone on the field next to you that does something amazing hypes you up.”

This season’s highlight was a Christmas Eve eve gift, London Irish striking against the grain in the final minute to see out a December 23 home win over Saracens. “We were two points ahead with a minute on the clock when they got a penalty and kicked it out on the halfway. We turned over the lineout and Tom Pearson ran almost onto the five and we scored off that.”

Pace is the joyous London Irish calling card, the likes of Henry Arundell, Ollie Hassell-Collins and Ben Loader underpinning the attack-from-anywhere mentality. “If someone kicks a ball onto Henry at full-back, or Ben or Ollie, as you are running back you are always expecting something to happen from them.

“That is amazing, to have that type of running mindset to go, ‘Listen, something is going to happen now’. If I’m in the midfield and have someone like Henry outside, you always think if there is a little bit of space my mind says to get the ball to them and they can use that space. If they get half a gap, they are probably gone.”

How does van Rensburg shape up against this lot in the sprint stakes? “No, not a chance. I don’t think I’d ever take them on in a sprint. They’re not in my league, they are definitely a few leagues above me. With the speed they are, they can take on one another, but I would challenge them in a breakdown contest maybe.”

That’s naughty. Sticking the head in where it potentially gets hurt is trademark van Rensburg. Coming into this weekend’s round 17 fixtures, he rated joint seventh on the list of turnovers won. His tally of 11 was equal to Tom Curry, not shabby at all in a breakdown foraging list topped by Will Evans, Ben Earl and Tommy Reffell. Why is the South African so fearlessly potent in this skill?

“That is something I just grew up with, I have no idea where it comes from or why I started doing it. It’s not a usual thing for a back to do but I just grew up doing it. You have to pick your moments when you want to do it and then you just hope for the best, not getting any injuries or whatever. I don’t try and think too much, if I see that opportunity I just go for it.

“The biggest thing is you don’t want to have that mindset, ‘Oh s***, if I go there I might get an injury or someone might hurt me, whatever’. I just think if you have the right posture going over that ball and you just stay strong over the ball, stay as strong as possible, you don’t have to worry about anything.

“I mean, accidents maybe do happen but if you don’t think about it too much then hopefully it won’t happen to you. Yeah, just try not to think about it too much, try not to think about all the worst things that can happen. I mean, it is a good thing to have. Making a turnover at the breakdown is a big momentum shift for your team, so try not to think about it too much.

“As a defence, the best outcome is to get a turnover or force an error from them. It is definitely a big momentum shift if you can get a breakdown turnover, it shifts the mindset from defence to attack and if you get a penalty at the breakdown it gets you 25, 30 metres up the field and maybe into their 22 or into their half where you can play your attacking rugby.”

Van Rensburg never doubted his rugby potential despite his off-the-beaten-track upbringing in Thabazimbi. Notable performances for the Leopards U19s were followed by university days at NWU Pukke where his progress was accelerated by a 2016 Varsity Cup title and selection for the South Africa U20s.

“I wouldn’t say I doubted that I was going to make it. I was in a very small school, so I went to university with the mindset of, ‘I’m going to study and play as much rugby as I can and just enjoy it’. I didn’t have that thought that I might play professional rugby one day, but then things just started working out for me a little bit.

“I got called up into the Varsity Cup group and we won it that season. From there on, I was ‘I can actually make it’ and since then I had that mindset that I never doubted myself.”

A curiosity about that pivotal university breakthrough was van Rensburg being the scorer of rugby’s first-ever nine-point try. “That was something they brought in that year just to make it more exciting, to get teams to run the ball out of their own half, and I was very lucky that I was on the receiving end of the first one. Nine points and the conversion was an extra two.”

Would he like that type of scoring quirk used in the Premiership? “I don’t really know. We would enjoy it because we score tries from everywhere but nine points is a lot. I remember one game, we had two slip-offs one after another and just like that, you were 22 points behind. It’s a little bit wild. I don’t know if that is going to work over here, but London Irish would benefit a lot from it.”

Back, though, to his South African backstory: After college, the Sharks took an immediate shine but it was at the Cheetahs, following a brief detour to the Southern Kings, where van Rensburg came of age in the pro game. Franco Smith was the facilitator, allowing the then fly-half to learn the ropes in both midfield positions.

He is forever grateful for that tuition and annoyed that the Cheetahs, along with the disbanded Kings, are no longer URC participants. Instead, the big-four South African franchises muscled in on a territory where the Bloemfontein club were pioneers in coming north to play.

“I wish there were more teams. There are so many young boys who want to play rugby and not enough space in the four big franchises, I almost want to say I made my name when I played at the Cheetahs and when they had a competition to play in. I don’t really know how you fix something like that but if you can maybe have more teams in South Africa, it would benefit a lot of the younger guys who come out of school.

Benhard Janse van Rensburg in his Cheetahs days clashing with Leinster's Fergus McFadden (Photo by Harry Murphy/Sportsfile via Getty Images)

“For a youngster to go through all the ranks in South Africa, it is tight and you have to be disciplined in yourself, work really hard to be seen. I played Varsity Cup and after that went to the Sharks. I didn’t play as much but then I got the opportunity to play under Franco Smith at the Cheetahs and that was just amazing for me. He wanted to give me a go in the centres and now I’m capable of playing fly-half, inside centre, outside centre.”

BV as he is known - ‘The first letter of my name and the first letter of my surname to keep it as short as possible’ - these days keeps himself busy away from rugby on the golf course. “The weather makes it a little difficult to play in the winter because it is very wet and cold. I normally play off a nine handicap but I didn’t play so well the last few rounds, so I’m probably higher than that.”

With Bath now beaten on the rugby pitch, next up for London Irish is next Saturday night’s rendezvous at Brentford with Leicester. Picking up points during this Six Nations period is crucial for the end-of-term ambitions. “After these games, we will know better who is going to qualify. It is also important to take advantage of some of the teams losing a few players to the Six Nations squads.

“Brentford is an amazing stadium to play at, amazing atmosphere. I’m very glad we have got those wins against Saracens, Bristol, Harlequins - they are big wins and hopefully we can keep the fans coming.”