Erasmus Reveals Unorthodox ‘Split Squad’ Masterplan After Springboks Nil Wales
Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus turned his attention to the next assignment against Argentina in two weeks after giving his side a pass mark following their 43-0 (19-0 halftime) victory over Wales in a Nations Championship Test in Durban on Saturday.
Erasmus revealed that a squad of 26 players would travel to South America, while a group of 15 or 16 players would remain in South Africa with some of the coaching staff to prepare for Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry against New Zealand in August and September.
“To get 43 points and keep them to nil – we’re satisfied with that,” said Erasmus.
“Forty-three-nil was definitely better than last week, certainly defensively, but it’s easier to defend on a wet field like that. We also had no injuries, so that’s good.
“I think we’ve improved a little in every game of the Nations Championship, but because we’ve been rotating the squad, it does affect cohesion.”
Erasmus said the conditions were deceptively difficult, leading to a succession of handling errors.
“We saw world-class players knock the ball on a few times in this game. The field was really slippery, and you could feel during the warm-up that it was extremely greasy.
“It was tough to play an expansive, attractive game in weather like that against a team that really wanted to defend.
“But we didn’t lose a lineout, and while we weren’t at our best in the scrums last week, we were much better today. Our maul defence and attacking maul were both good. Those were areas we wanted to fix, and I think we managed to address a lot of them.
“In this game we learned that our defence was better than last week because we worked really hard on it. Our set piece was also very solid, and I think some of the players handled the pressure of Test rugby much better than they did last week. A lot of guys came through this Test with ticks next to their names.”
Vusi Moyo, the youngest flyhalf in Springbok history at 20 years and 27 days, came through his baptism of fire as Erasmus continued building depth in the squad.
“He definitely played well,” Erasmus said.
“You could see there were nerves. He’s a really accurate kicker and kicks off well, but then you get into a Test match like this with a big crowd, a wet ball, and suddenly you don’t find the corners with your kicks and your restarts aren’t landing where you want them to.
“I thought he handled it extremely well. But I’ve been there myself. In your first or second Test, you get tired because of the nerves, and I thought his tyres were a little pap (flat) in the second half, which is why we took him off.”
Looking ahead to the Argentina tour, Erasmus confirmed that Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu would be available, although Handré Pollard had suffered a hamstring injury.
“Argentina are going to be tough. Like Wales, they’ve had our number a few times, and our biggest defeat since we’ve been together from 2018 was against them. We’re just trying to build our game, and I think today was another step forward.”
