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Springboks latest on the Erasmus hearing and his role versus Wales
By Liam Heagney
The Springboks are still in the dark regarding a verdict from the weekend disciplinary hearing that Rassie Erasmus attended following a misconduct charge filed against him following his criticism of the match officials after South Africa were defeated by the Lions in last July's first Test match of the three-game series in Cape Town.
Erasmus, the South African director of rugby, had spent that game running water onto the pitch to the Springboks players and he infamously released a 62-minute video in the aftermath challenging a multitude of decisions made during the match by referee Nic Berry and his team of officials.
The 2019 Springboks World Cup-winning boss didn't travel with his squad to Australia for the subsequent four-game leg of the Rugby Championship that was staged in Queensland over the course of September and October.
However, he is now with head coach Jacques Nienaber and everyone else in Cardiff as the Springboks prepare for next Saturday's opening game in their three-match northern hemisphere November tour which also features fixtures against Scotland and England.
Nienaber had technological issues before announcing his team on Tuesday to face Wales and he ironically wound up using the laptop belonging to Erasmus to conduct his media briefing via Microsoft Teams.
Asked if a verdict from last weekend's hearing had emerged yet, Nienaber said: "I don't think there is a verdict yet. I still think it is in recess or whatever they call it from a legal term. I don't know. But in fairness from our side, our track record against Wales in Cardiff speaks for itself, so I am trying not to think too much about that [the possible Erasmus verdict] and probably focus on the rugby side of things because we will have to have our ducks in a row if we want to look to be competitive with Wales on the weekend."
Regarding what role Erasmus will have for Saturday's match at the Principality Stadium, Nienaber added: "Rassie will be in the coaches box with us, yeah."
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Even with absences we still had the cattle to make the playoffs. As it was, we nearly stumbled our way into the top 8. Which shows just how easy it was to get there. And still we failed. As for Razor, there are many instances of him patching up the Crusaders roster. Numerous. Several players Id never heard of. Also, using AB legend John Afoa was a classic.
But, some of the games we were losing were from schoolboy errors, or downright confusion. Either the players were really dumb (they weren’t) or they were poorly coached. Given the repetitive nature of errors, brain fades, poor decision making, & loose structures, this all lands with the coaching group.
With only six playoff spots now in SR, & Aussie franchises now consolidated to four, 2025 looks like a tight one. We'll have to tough it out under Penney & hope for the best.
Go to commentsAgree we need a 10, 12, 13 refresh. ASAP. Well, next season now lol. Reiko should be put back on the wing. He'll be an absolute menace there. Imagine 11 Reiko 14 Clarke 15 Jordan as the backfield unit.
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