Blame circumstance for lack of young SA rugby players

Had he the choice, coach Harry Viljoen would probably not have brought his Springboks to England for this tour.

In fact, like his immediate predecessor Nick Mallett, there are probably many things he would have changed about the itinerary.

Mallett used to often complain that his task of bringing through a new game-plan was complicated by the fact that the fixture list was dominated by matches against teams from the top five of world rugby.

I well remember him saying at the beginning of the 2000 season that his plans - like Viljoen he also spoke of revolutionising the South African approach - were hampered by being handed a fixture list that was tougher than the World Cup.

Viljoen could easily say the same about this year.

Considering where he was going with the team and the radical shifts he was intending, the two home tests against France represented a daunting start to the year. It was compounded by the fact that the French are notoriously unpredictable.

While critics and the public expected easy wins for the Boks, the realities of French rugby meant the opposite was true. It was not until the third match that the Boks played relatively easy opposition, but by the time Italy arrived in Port Elizabeth the pressure was on after two consecutive poor performances against the French.

From there it was straight into the Tri-Nations, after which we arrived where we are now - a year-end tour which, as Mallett suggests in his column on another website, should be all about development and the blooding of young players.

But while much of what he writes I agree with, I do find it ironic that Mallett should describe Viljoen's selections for this tour as another wasted opportunity in that he has not chosen young players and continued with the new gameplan - actually we still have to see a start on that score - that he remains committed to in the long-term.

Ironic because Mallett should know better than any of us the peculiar and inordinate pressures that are brought on a Springbok coach to win every single match he plays.

Mallett did try it when he swopped and changed players at the start of the last World Cup season like Elizabeth Taylor used to go through husbands - but he very quickly learned the folly of his ways when the public and press turned on him in defeat.

Rugby coaching, particularly when you are involved with the Springboks, is not a simple business. It sounded like another excuse, but Viljoen was right when he spoke about the fine balancing act between long-term development and ensuring the team remains relatively successful in the here and now.

Back in June I wrote that Viljoen was overdoing his emphasis on the 2003 World Cup. I argued that fans paid big money for each and every test and hence deserved to see the best available Springbok team of that particular time in action.

I still believe too much emphasis is at times put on an event which only comes around once every four years and which is often decided by a freakish performance, such as the Jannie de Beer dropped-goals or the French semi-final win against the All Blacks.

There is still a lot of rugby to be played etween now and the start of the 2003 World Cup and the paying patrons and other stake-holders cannot be expected to accept mediocrity.

What Viljoen needs to do is not make wholesale changes, which proved disastrous in the opening test of the year at Ellis Park, but to introduce young players around a core of experienced and proven performers.

Most good cricket coaches appreciate the benefit of having their young players bat in partnership with more experienced campaigners. It should be the same with rugby.

So any suggestion at this stage that Mark Andrews should be put out to pasture is wide of the mark (excuse the pun) in that the last thing the Boks need is to be running out against England at Twickenham with an inexperienced pack.

Joost van der Westhuizen may be a different story in that it has been a while now since he was last the old Joost, but even here Viljoen could put up a credible argument about the need to have experienced players on either side of Louis Koen in what is essentially his first really big occasion match for the Boks.

I don't know who Mallett is referring to when he says Viljoen should have blooded younger players on this tour. If he has Chris Rossouw in mind I agree fully with his view.

But if Viljoen had brought any more than that on this trip he would have been criticised for exactly the opposite reasons that he is being lambasted now.

When Viljoen selected young North-West rookie Francois Swart for a training camp in Plettenberg Bay he drew a vitriolic reaction from the press and the public. Never mind that it was just a training camp and no Springbok jerseys were being handed out.

When Conrad Jantjes first started figuring ahead of Tinus Delport and Percy Montgomery he received a similar response.

The introduction of the talented young Joe van Niekerk ahead of the older but more established and undeniably gifted Rassie Erasmus was quite rightly built into a major controversy.

Even the appearance of young Adrian Jacobs' name ahead of the more experienced Deon Kayser when the squad was announced for the home French tests attracted an angry response.

When 21 year-old Butch James, the hero of the most recent Super 12 season, missed a couple of kicks the public quickly started to call for the return of Braam van Straaten, who is a veteran by comparison.

An ideal end of year tour, given where the Boks are now in their development, would have seen the Boks going to Argentina before coming to Italy and then continuing to Scotland and maybe Wales.

Then Viljoen could probably have got away with selecting a whole gaggle of newcomers as the pressure to win would not have been as intense.

I stick by my view that Viljoen should trust his instincts more. Adrian Jacobs, in the quest for some much needed creativity, should have been tried against Italy and there are too many cart-horses in the current backline.

But the more I think about it the more convinced I am that Viljoen is in a situation aptly once summed up by the late Afrikaans cricket and rugby commentator Gerhard Viviers, who reacted to the divergent views of his critics by saying "Wen kon jy nie".

For the record the young players that have been tried out since Viljoen took over as coach include relative newcomers to top-level rugby in James (now injured), Marius Joubert (also injured), Van Niekerk, Jantjes, Lukas van Biljon, Neil de Kock, Deon de Kock, Jacobs, Trevor Halstead, Dean Hall and Victor Matfield. Several others have been tried in training camps.

In addition he has continued with some of the younger players introduced during the Mallett era such as John Smit and, latterly, Louis Koen.

If you consider the itinerary the Boks have been faced with this year, the above amounts to quite an extensive list.