Last Saturday night at the newly minted Sydney Football Stadium the prematch fireworks were spectacular and the atmosphere in the packed new stadium was sparkling.
But the event was spoiled for the locals as the Springboks produced a ferocious display of physicality in every aspect of their game and outplayed a woeful Wallaby team who never fired a shot.
Regrettably, for both teams and the packed house, the New Zealand referee Ben O’Keeffe awarded a staggering 27 penalties. He contributed significantly to a match that held only a few precious seconds of Springbok excellence, zero contribution from the Wallabies with long periods of scrum, maul and penalty-induced boredom.
The match, like far too many others across the globe, was a zombie with an entertainment factor of zero. The Springboks scored four tries but these added up to only a few seconds of joyous running. Their highly effective tactics of endless mauling and cross field kicking drained away any drop of joy that referee O’Keefe had not already pulled the plug on.
In a moment of life imitating art (or sheer poor timing), in last week’s column I wrote about the horrid practice of online bullying in rugby and the abuse our players and coaches were receiving from faceless keyboard warriors.
[ Matt Williams: Nic White’s dive does not justify horrific online abuseOpens in new window ]
On the same day at the end of the match in Sydney, I tweeted: “Overly technical officials mixed with ultra negative tactics of the Springboks make for a terrible spectacle. Wallabies disappointingly poor ...”
That tweet was picked up by a mainstream media personality in South Africa. Then the pile on began. The abuse continued for several days.
Lots of swearing and name calling — by the by, moron has only one “r”. The majority consisted of sticks and stones stuff, mindless abuse from a bunch of cowards displaying an appalling lack of rugby knowledge.
Those who bothered to talk rugby, playing the ball and not the man — admittedly, there weren’t many of these contributions — had a consistent theme. They would always support a boring game plan as long as the Boks won, the attitude was no matter what the means, they were justified by the ends.
Several times South African supporters pointed to the fact that in Sydney the Boks scored four tries, made 64 more running metres than Australia (hardly significant considering how woeful the Wallabies were) and made seven line breaks. According to the apologists, that had to equal entertainment.
As rugby supporters they have every right to hold the opinion that the game was a beacon of fluidity and joy. I don’t agree with it, but I do respect their right to hold that opinion.
What no person has the right to do is to abuse others who hold a different opinion. The most bizarre piece of abuse came from a zealot who claimed to have been “saved by Jesus”. In a ranting-muddled spew, the abuser finished with the fact that he was praying to Jesus for New Zealand to defeat the Wallabies in every Bledisloe Cup match. As far as having your prayers answered, that one must be filed in the category of extremely low-hanging fruit.
If you want to challenge the Big Fella, ask him for the Wallabies to win the Bledisloe. Now that would be a miracle.
In its current form, Twitter has descended into a cesspool, where pieces of broken humanity attempt to drag the rest of us down into the mire of their pain. The process has been described as damaged people trying to damage other people.
The rest of us have a responsibility to stand up to the haters and the bullies. So here is the argument against the current Springboks style of play, minus the abuse.
The Springboks game plan is usually based on selecting 14 forwards in their match day 23. The primary purpose of these giant forward is to scrummage relentlessly for penalties.
The Boks always select a top quality punter and place-kicker at outhalf. He might have the hands of Venus de Milo, but as long as he can kick he gets the jersey. So when in goal kicking range he takes every shot.
If it’s too far out they kick for touch and the following lineout, almost exclusively, produces a maul, which is designed to engineer yet more penalties.
The Boks possess a highly talented backline. Lukhanyo Am and Damian de Allende are what I consider to be the premier centre pairing in world rugby. Yet South Africa rarely apply a creative backline attack from a set play. Primarily they simply physically hit it up. That is like driving a Ferrari in Dublin city traffic. Its talent is totally underutilised.
Across the Rugby Championship, South Africa have the lowest number of ball carries per match of any team. Not once have they had over 100 ball carries in a game. Argentina (once), Australia (twice) and New Zealand (three times,) have all carried the ball in a match over 100 times.
So this lack of ball carrying is not because of a lack of talent. It is a tactical decision.
If the Boks attack has not made a clean break around tackle number four, their outhalf kicks a high ball across the field for a contestable catch on the open side winger, behind the defenders’ line.
At its heart, the South African tactics deny the considerable attacking talents of their own players the opportunity to express themselves and run with the ball in hand
— Matt Williams
The Boks have kicked the ball an eye-watering 104 times in the last four games. By far the most of the Championship teams. Last week they kicked 31 times in a performance their supporters believed to be entertaining.
The horrors of this Springboks game plan played a significant role in the worst Lions tour in living memory. These same tactics then produced a World Cup final that was an exceptionally poor advertisement for our game.
Last weekend’s match in Sydney was a replica of that 2019 final.
There were a few seconds of absolute brilliance from the Springboks, but the vast majority of the time was filled with penalties, scrums, kicks, mauls and stoppages that bored the socks off any rugby supporter across the globe not wearing a green jersey.
In the first test against Australia in Adelaide the ball was in play for only a shocking 29 minutes. In Sydney, we only managed 33 minutes and that does not show the amount of time the ball was in play but trapped inside a maul.
In other words, the ball was out of play with nothing happening in Adelaide for 51 minutes and in Sydney 47 minutes. Far too much time without any rugby happening creating horrid spectacles.
At its heart, the South African tactics deny the considerable attacking talents of their own players the opportunity to express themselves and run with the ball in hand. South Africans should demand to see more of the likes of de Allende, Am, de Klerk, Kolbe and Mapimpi.
What is even more frustrating is that right across their playing roster the Springboks possess incredible attacking talent. If the Boks changed their culture to executing an expansive game plan, similar to France, Ireland and New Zealand, with the high calibre of players at their disposal I have little doubt that they would dominate world rugby.
So for the rest of us, maybe it’s best we put up with boring.
For the record, when Joe Schmidt was coaching Ireland I expressed similar comments about the then Irish game plan. Many times across several seasons I criticised the Irish tactics, yet never once did I receive abuse or bullying. People in Irish rugby disagreed with me, which they have every right to do, but there was never abuse.
No matter what your opinion is of the South African attack or any topic for that matter, all of us in rugby have a responsibility to respect each other’s opinions. That means standing up to online bullies. They are not part of rugby’s values or culture.
Whenever their warped minds attempt to intimidate or wound there must be no exceptions in calling them out.
