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The reasons why England admit Springboks pack has grown since 2019
By Liam Heagney
The Springboks will arrive at Twickenham this Saturday having only played a dozen matches since being crowned World Cup winners in November 2019, but England assistant Matt Proudfoot has claimed this South African pack - which now includes Ox Nche - has grown in the two years since then despite their limited number of matches.
Proudfoot was part of the Springboks staff that helped Siya Kolisi and co go all the way to glory in Japan and while he has since worked with England in their 18 games in 2020 and 2021, he believes there has been an evolution in the South Africans since the last meeting between the two countries.
Jacques Nienaber is now the Springboks head coach and while he will go into battle this Saturday at Twickenham with five of the same starting pack that won the day in Yokohama, England scrum coach Proudfoot reckoned the visitors' forwards now pose an even greater threat than at the finals 24 months ago.
"They have grown, Ox Nche has been a revelation for them coming in and taking the starting loosehead position from the Beast [Tendai Mtawarira]," he insisted when asked to compare the then and now Springboks packs. "A very different player. He has got a very different skillset.
"If you look at the bomb squad that comes on with Steven (Kitshoff) and Malcolm (Marx), they have just grown in confidence, they know their role and they are very comfortable in their role so they have become a lot more experienced. They can handle different challenges that get presented to them.
"The last two games (against Scotland and Wales) they have had to chase from late on, they were behind at stages and just how they were able to handle that. If you think in the World Cup they were ahead, so they were in the pound seats and they could control the game. I see there has been an evolution in their mindset and they are a lot more resilient, a lot more adaptive and that comes with experience so they have grown since 2019.
"Their pack is very important to them," added Proudfoot. "As long as their pack goes forward their team does well. Their maul is just as important. They try to have two really big platforms that are important to them that if one day one isn't working well they can go to the other. They try to have two big weapons.
"They have a couple of powerful facets to their game but those tend to be two really emotive ones, they tend to drive them and it is going to be a challenge to confront those two. We have done our homework and have some really good plans and we are looking forward to the challenge of executing those plans."
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The boy needs to bulk up if wants to play 10 or 11 to handle those hits, otherwise he could always make a brilliant reserve for the wings if he stays away from the stretcher.
Go to commentsIn another recent article I tried to argue for a few key concept changes for EPCR which I think could light the game up in the North.
First, I can't remember who pointed out the obvious elephant in the room (a SA'n poster?), it's a terrible time to play rugby in the NH, and especially your pinnacle tournament. It's been terrible watching with seemingly all the games I wanted to watch being in the dark, hardly able to see what was going on. The Aviva was the only stadium I saw that had lights that could handle the miserable rain. If the global appeal is there, they could do a lot better having day games.
They other primary idea I thuoght would benefit EPCR most, was more content. The Prem could do with it and the Top14 could do with something more important than their own league, so they aren't under so much pressure to sell games. The quality over quantity approach.
Trim it down to two 16 team EPCR competitions, and introduce a third for playing amongst the T2 sides, or the bottom clubs in each league should simply be working on being better during the EPCR.
Champions Cup is made up of league best 15 teams, + 1, the Challenge Cup winner. Without a reason not to, I'd distribute it evenly based on each leauge, dividing into thirds and rounded up, 6 URC 5 Top14 4 English. Each winner (all four) is #1 rank and I'd have a seeding round or two for the other 12 to determine their own brackets for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. I'd then hold a 6 game pool, home and away, with consecutive of each for those games that involve SA'n teams. Preferrably I'd have a regional thing were all SA'n teams were in the same pool but that's a bit complex for this simple idea.
That pool round further finalises the seeding for knockout round of 16. So #1 pool has essentially duked it out for finals seeding already (better venue planning), and to see who they go up against 16, 15,etc etc. Actually I think I might prefer a single pool round for seeding, and introduce the home and away for Ro16, quarters, and semis (stuffs up venue hire). General idea to produce the most competitive matches possible until the random knockout phase, and fix the random lottery of which two teams get ranked higher after pool play, and also keep the system identical for the Challenge Cup so everthing is succinct. Top T2 side promoted from last year to make 16 in Challenge Cup
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