How Smit can make it to World Cup

The anticipated return to rugby of Bismarck du Plessis, scheduled for this week, has intensified the speculation over the future of John Smit.

The Springbok captain came under fire from critics after the recent Tri-Nations tour of New Zealand and Australia, and the celebrated skipper might be the first to admit that he was not at his best. The most disturbing aspect of his game was not the lineout throwing that uncharacteristically deserted him on occasion, but his perceived lack of pace around the field.

Opinion is divided on how much the Springboks need to reinvent their game in order to catch up with the fleet-footed New Zealanders, who have certainly stolen a march on last year’s Tri-Nations champions during the past 10 months. Since last year’s Tri-Nations ended, the All Blacks have been unbeaten, while the Boks have lost five test matches and two midweek games.

In my own view a complete reinvention of the Bok strategy so that the Boks are trying to beat Australia and New Zealand at their own game would be suicide. The problem with South African players is that they too often consider a call to be more expansive to be the same as saying they must abandon all structure.

What is inarguable though is that even if there is not too much of a shift in strategy, the game is being played at a quicker tempo, and modern rugby demands certain attributes from players in some positions. For instance, it should now be seen as a non-negotiable that the hooker should be mobile, which Smit just isn’t going to be at this stage of his career.

His strong scrumming does make up for his lack of mobility to a far greater extent than many realise, which is why I would hesitate to go as far as some people have by suggesting this is a time for the selection of someone like Schalk Britz. If you struggle in the scrums, you give away penalties – we have seen that across all levels recently – and those penalties have a big negative impact on team momentum.

Du Plessis though doesn’t carry many question marks over his scrumming ability, and his on-the-ball aggression (a qualification that needs to be made in these days of raining yellow cards) plus his ability as a ball scavenger mean that he should provide a significant boost to the Boks once he regains full fitness.

But a quick return to full form for the feisty hooker may not be the problem many anticipate it being to Smit’s hopes of continuing as captain. For while the suggestion of yet another selection switch and experiment should rightly be greeted with circumspection, there is a solution – play Smit at loosehead prop.

Smit played with only limited effect at tighthead for a year in what was ultimately a doomed experiment, but he made a successful switch to loosehead for the Sharks earlier this season.

Even though Beast Mtawarira is also on the Sharks’ books, by the end of the Super 14 there was little doubt that he was the man considered first choice loosehead by the Sharks coaches. It was only Du Plessis’s injury that saw Smit end the Super 14 season at hooker.

Smit’s extra bulk and apparent lack of pace around the park would be less critical at loosehead than it would be at hooker. Moving Smit to loosehead will enable him to be more comfortably accommodated within the starting team, and thus end the speculation over whether he is worth his place.

That last point is critical, as there are times when humans, in the way they interact with one another within social structures, are not completely unlike lions, who eject the leader from the pride when he shows signs of weakness or when there is a younger lion ready to mount a challenge.

This is a time when the Boks need strong leadership and Smit’s experience of having led the Boks to a World Cup triumph is something the coach relies heavily on. Smit played well enough at loosehead in the Super 14 to suggest a shift to that position as a viable solution to a thorny problem.