Bulls provide platform for Bok excellence

When Victor Matfield was asked by a British journalist whether his team could get any better in the series against the British and Irish Lions, he responded that the Springboks were a different team, with different players and a different game-plan.

The national side may indeed be a different team to the Bulls, but with reference to the last two points, the ones about the players and the game-plan, the obvious question needs to be asked. Why?

The point was made after their semi-final win over the Crusaders seven days ago that the Bulls were providing the template for Bok success against the Lions, and after their record 61-17 win over the Chiefs in this one-sided final, they have underlined it even more emphatically.

Zane Kirchner and Morne Steyn are two key Bulls players who now simply have to be selected for the Boks, and the stuttering display produced by the shadow Boks on Friday night in Windhoek, where they tried to run too much from their own half, was in sharp contrast to what we saw at Loftus.

The Bulls’ win should not have been a surprise to anyone who understands the importance of territory in modern rugby, as well as the massive role that a core of experienced players can play in driving a team.

Their coach Frans Ludeke was severely criticised last year when he took over from Heyneke Meyer and his team floundered in their struggle to adapt to the different challenges posed by the ELVs.

On Saturday night, as the coach of the newly crowned Super 14 champions, Ludeke was the first to praise the player leadership group.

“When you have a player driven system like we have then it is very easy to be a coach,” said Ludeke.

“I did not feel it was really necessary to say anything to the players before the game, and the same at half-time. These are experienced players, they know what is needed to win, and there was no doubt when I looked at them before the game that they were hungry.”

Ludeke’s experience might be mirrored by that of his Springbok counterpart Pieter de Villiers in the coming season. De Villiers’ biggest coup last season was his decision to empower the players after the failed Tri-Nations campaign, with skipper John Smit playing a pivotal role in the big win over England at the end of the year.

Smit will lean heavily on Matfield and his Bulls lieutenant Fourie du Preez in the coming international season, and that pair appear to have played a similar role at the Bulls that Smit did at the Boks.

The value of experience and proven class was underlined in Windhoek the previous night, with it being no coincidence that the arrival onto the field of Jean de Villiers and Juan Smith came at the same time as the shadow team picked up their game and powered to victory.

Former Bok coach Jake White used to talk ad nauseam about the number of international caps boasted by his team, and he was often ridiculed for it. But the accumulation of experience paid off with the winning of the 2007 World Cup, and De Villiers can now reap the benefits of that platform, just as Ludeke has been able to build on the foundations built by Heyneke Meyer.

The England team that won the World Cup in 2003 may have owed their success less to the onfield coaching of Clive Woodward than they did to the enormous depth of experience built up through his policy of continuity in selection over several years.

The chances of the Bulls building further on this record breaking season, which included a record winning run at Loftus, the most successive Bulls victories, and the biggest winning margin in the final, could depend on how many of the current players they hold onto.

Already at the post-match press conference at Loftus questions were asked of Bryan Habana and Wynand Olivier, two players believed to be considering overseas options. Neither of them gave a direct answer, they said they would wait for the next two months and see what transpired before making up their minds.

If they do leave, the transition period, when new players fit into their jerseys, has to be managed properly – and again, the senior players will have a big role to play. As long as the leadership core remains intact, new stars such as the impressive flanker Dewald Potgieter can continue to flourish and hopefully they will have become legends of the game when the current legends decide to retire.

This has been a season, and a final, where several new Bulls stars were born, Kirchner and Potgieter being the most obvious, and Steyn has finally emerged from any shadow cast by the departed Derick Hougaard to become the new “Liefling” of Loftus. There is no reason the Bulls should not challenge for the Super 14 trophy again next season, and if they do, you can expect the Boks to push for the No1 status they held at the end of 2007 and relinquished in 2008.