Bokwatch 5

In the fifth edition of Bokwatch, John Smit talks about the Springboks’ upcoming World Cup campaign, Wallaby coach John ‘Knuckles’ Connolly reveals that he’d rather face the Boks than England in the RWC quarter-finals, Bok centre Jean De Villiers talks about the injury he sustained against Namibia last week and Jake White reviews the warm-up game between Samoa and English club Harlequins.

Springbok captain John Smit talked about his role as captain of the Springbok team.

“I’m the furthermost thing from a dictator type of captain,” Smit told rugby365.

“For me, personally, the biggest asset is that we’ve got four Springbok captains in this squad, as well as guys who have captained their Provinces… like Gary Botha and Wikus van Heerden.

“That takes a huge amount of pressure off. I know when it comes to the line-outs I don’t worry, that’s Victor’s story, he takes complete control. When it comes to scrums Os du Randt is there and in complete control.

“That is a massive asset for me as a captain as well.

“I might be the guy who’s got the title, but there is literally seven or eight guys working at my job all the time.”

He is looking forward to leading the Boks in this year’s World Cup – something he couldn’t have imagined when making his debut in 2000.

“In 2000 I couldn’t believe my eyes when I was sitting around with guys like Joost van der Westhuizen, Mark Andrews and André Venter.

“I felt like I was lost or won a ticket or something.

“I’ve been very lucky with my family and wife – every time I’ve been selected they’ve come to me and said well done, because it is a massive opportunity and you never know when this can end.

“I’ve been working for this since the day I started playing rugby, even when I started dreaming about it – or watching the Final in ’95.

“I looked at those guys and I was as excited as every single one of them and I thought ‘imagine me being that guy on the field saying a prayer in a circle and touching that Cup.

“This is that chance. We’re nowhere near it yet, we’ve still got to get there and do it so that’s the excitement,” said the Bok captain.

Australian coach John Connolly revealed that  he would rather play against South Africa in the World Cup quarter-finals than defending champions England.
“You know what you’re going to get from the Springboks,” he told The Australian newspaper.

“But this England side is dangerous across the board. Its core game – its scrum and line-out – is very strong; it has a lot of good young back row forwards.

“It has Jonny Wilkinson at fly-half and it has pace at the back. You can do a lot of damage with those components.”

He admitted that the Boks might be slightly more unpredictable than usual with former Wallabies coach Eddie Jones’ now assisting the South Africans.

“It’s a huge advantage when someone jumps ship so quickly and unexpectedly.

“He has taken a lot of intellectual property with him.

“He knows how Australia breaks down the Springboks and he knows all the strengths and weaknesses of the Wallabies.

“It’s hard to say whether he’ll change their game.

“Maybe he’ll have the same influence on the Boks that he had on Queensland.”

Knuckles also rubbished the widely held belief that the All Blacks are Rugby World Cup chokers.

“That whole choker thing is just nonsense.

“They were probably over-confident when they played Australia in the last World Cup after beating them 50-21 earlier in 2003, and they eased off against France in 1999 when they led 24-10 five minutes into the second half. They thought they had it in the bag, but France had a bit of luck and their whole game ignited.

“I don’t think any of that will have any relevance this time,” concluded Connolly.

Jean De Villiers spoke about the rib injury he sustained in the Boks’ warm-up game against Namibia last Wednesday.

“I got a huge shock, but it could have been worse,” said De Villiers.

“Taking the law of averages into account one would not have thought that I’d find myself in that situation again.

“It was not so much about the pain, but the emotion..

“The whole thing in 2003 played out in my mind, I thought ‘here we go again, I’m going to miss another World Cup’. Luckily it’s not as bad as I thought it would be, and I am going to the World Cup. This is a big relief,” said the Bok centre.

Jake White attended Samoa’s warm-up match against Harlequins in London, a game that the Samoa’s lost. The Boks face Samoa in the pool stages of the Rugby World Cup.

“There’s not much you can take out of it,” White told The Sunday Times of the Samoans’ loss to the English club side.

“Samoa were really poor, they looked like a team that hasn’t played together.

“It was amazing, other than that they lost to a club side. There’s nothing to take away from the game. If they play like that against us …”

Samoan coach Michael Jones talked about his side’s plan for the World Cup.

“If you look at their track record and most recent form, people are telling us we should be targeting the England match as must-win, but it’s not like that at all for us,” the former All Blacks loose forward told Reuters.

“We have to target the South African game and try and roll them.

“Then we have to get past Tonga, who are very similar to us and can cause an upset. They play the same way and they could beat us, then we have to play England six days later.

“We have had the opportunity to build a squad over the past four years and this year we have had a five-stage road map, which we have been following.

“We took a development side to South Africa and Australia, then we had the Pacific Six Nations, then our team trials, a training camp in Samoa and now our final camp here at Loughborough and play games against Harlequins, Northampton and Sale,” said Jones.