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South Africa won 33-26 in a game where their most famous weapon — the scrum — didn’t dominate. And that’s precisely the point: it’s the win that says the most about where the Springboks are.
Winning with different weapons
A week ago at Ellis Park the South African pack crushed the New Zealand scrum, and lost. In Cape Town the All Blacks worked hard to contain it, sharpening a few early engagements, and this time South Africa won anyway. The weapons were different: superiority in the aerial battle, the usual vertical game, and surgical work on the opposition lineout — balls stolen from the All Blacks inside their own 22 at key moments, like Eben Etzebeth‘s steal that killed New Zealand’s best multi-phase attack of the second half.
And when the game came down to a single possession, the breakdown settled it: Andre Esterhuizen‘s steal over the final ball — clean, crystal clear.
The atomic fly
Then there’s him. Cheslin Kolbe finished with 18 points off the tee — four penalties and three conversions — on an everywhere-man kind of night: on the live stream DanPat renamed him “the atomic fly”, borrowing Pozzecco’s old nickname from Italian basketball. Uncommon rugby intelligence, uncommon courage, uncommon athleticism, in an utterly common-sized body.
The goal-kicking story captures the character: inside the Springbok coaching room the reasoning — as DanPat reconstructs it — must have been simple. Feinberg-Mngomezulu misses a few too many, Libbok likewise, Willemse the same. “Wait — we’ve got the guy who does everything.” And the guy who does everything kicked the lot.
Why are the Springboks a step ahead?
For DanPat it’s the sum of the parts: they won without the scrum dominance they can rediscover any week now; they contained a side that moves the ball like no one else; and they carry an experience bank — reigning world champions, men like Pieter-Steph du Toit with the individual silverware already won — that tells in one-score finishes.
“Right now I see the Springboks a step ahead of the All Blacks.”
A word of caution before installing them as outright favourites: the All Blacks finished one ball short of a draw, and they have legs to burn — Will Jordan, sevens convert Leroy Carter, Jordie Barrett, Ruben Love. When they stretch a defence, they hurt anyone. The road to the World Cup is still very long; meanwhile, on Saturday 5 September in Johannesburg, with the series level, the winner takes the lead before the Baltimore finale.
Read also
- Springboks 33-26 All Blacks: series level at 1-1
- Scrum and metres to South Africa, the win to New Zealand
- All DanPat Rugby news
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