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Springboks fly out to Argentina with a warning from Rassie Erasmus
By Liam Heagney
Rassie Erasmus has issued a warning to his Springboks ahead of their Rugby Championship round five encounter with Argentina next weekend. The South Africans flew out of Cape Town on Saturday ahead of their September 21 Santiago del Estero clash with Los Pumas and they took to the skies with a reminder from their head coach that nothing will come easy for his champions-elect in South America.
Speaking to sarugby.co.za, Erasmus said: “It doesn’t matter how one looks at it – we don’t want to lose against Argentina, and it is exactly the same for them. They must firmly believe they are still in the running for the trophy, so whether we win or they win, both teams will be very hungry.
“It is definitely hostile over there, but we don’t find them to be hostile in terms of fear, but rather passionate fans enjoying supporting their team. They have a few legends there, and they are a well-coached team that beat the All Blacks and registered the biggest score ever over Australia, so in their hearts we have no doubt they will believe they can beat us.
"It will come down to preparation, who pitches up the best on the day and which side is the most desperate because I don’t think there’s much separating the teams.”
After defeating the All Blacks last weekend in Cape Town to chalk up their fourth win in four outings in the 2024 Championship, the Springboks are poised to clinch their first title in this tournament since 2019.
Just three match points from their final two matches – they also host Argentina in Nelspruit on September 28 – will crown them champions. Ahead of their South American trip, they assembled in Stellenbosch on Wednesday evening for a full two-day mini-camp before flying out on Saturday with a squad of 28.
Seasoned players such as Willie Le Roux, Damian de Allende, Cheslin Kolbe, Bongi Mbonambi, Frans Malherbe and Pieter-Steph du Toit, who all started against the All Blacks at DHL Stadium, were rested and have not travelled, as is Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, a round four replacement. Grant Williams was also ruled out on Thursday through injury.
The Springboks are flying to Buenos Aires via Sao Paolo in Brazil and they will make the trip to Santiago del Estero on Wednesday night. “Camps are always valuable, especially if you are going to try players in different positions, and the guys definitely used the two days together as well as they could," reckoned Erasmus.
"The journey to Argentina is a bit of a stretch, but at least we have done some work on them, so when we arrive there on Sunday we can hopefully hit the ground running."
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That’s not the only way to look at it. Every year there are players with breakout seasons in the feeder comp. Those players are fairly limited in what options they have because the Super sides operate as ‘clubs’ where they have people contracted for multiple years and no space available unlike contracting setups in the NFL. Going to four would force an improvement in player retention imo.
As per above I think there is a lot of intelligence in doing that. I reckon I could come up with a dead wood list of 30 names for you. But yes, it certainly means they would need to factor in a better way of making sure the right players are retained. I like small squads myself, but every year teams are needing to go well beyond their numbers and pick from those that remained in NZ after missing out on Super contracts, so just compensating by having fewer teams but larger squads would certainly be viable, especially the way they are injurying their players currently.
Why not just give them Moana figuretively speaking to have as their fourth side (so they need to drop a side so it can be 5 teams on each side of the ditch, with Drua having Fiji games as well)? That’s the point of my reply, that the Aussies should have actually consolidated to 3 teams years ago, not four, pertinent because the 11 teams currently is not ‘it’. Hey, if they can get a Jaguares, or (South) American team in with even half of Argentina’s test stars and most of all the others, as a 12th team willing to play within 10 hours flight, then great, that’s obviously the way to go. But weve heard nothing. I can’t see a 6th NZ team as they’ve refused profusely and it would take too much of a restructural step for them to accept imo.
Yep, that’s right, the 12 number is also not ‘it’. 10 rather than 12 gives them more flexibility imo. It could all change depending on what this new test window global season bs is going to be.
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