Keys to sustaining the Bok success

There is some irony in the fact that one of the consequences of the form shown by the Springbok players has been to ease the pressure which was being placed on the man who rubbished them so publicly three months ago.

It is the way of South African rugby that a winning Bok team tends to paper over cracks elsewhere. Of course, it also operates the other way around too, and when everything is going well in South African rugby through the various levels, this is lost on those who judge the administration only on the results of the national team.

So it probably is no coincidence that over the past two weeks (yes, that is all it has been, two weeks) while the Boks have been building hopes of a new dawn in the hearts of a long-suffering public, Sarfu president Brian van Rooyen has been mercifully anonymous in those parts of the newspapers where you find controversy.

Three good wins against Six Nations opposition has deflected the focus from the many problems associated with Van Rooyen’s administration style, and a winning Bok team has also enabled the president to resist the temptation to shoot from the cuff and be too precipitous with his public comments.

This is all good, for while people in high places are known to still be less than satisfied with Van Rooyen, at least the players (who have shown Van Rooyen they are not pathetic) have brought some confidence back to the people upon whom the game depends for its continued health.

And maybe, just maybe, the hiatus which it has brought in the never-ending pressure which was applied to Van Rooyen in his first six months in charge will bring a further positive in giving the man himself some space and time to enable him to take stock and perhaps redress those things that have caused him so many problems.

It was pleasing to note that Van Rooyen, in saying that Nick Mallett has a place in South African rugby, admitted that he had made many mistakes in his first six months in charge and that he has now learned the necessity of wide consultation with all people who can make a contribution.

If a man can admit his mistakes, then there is always some hope. It should go without saying that Mallett, with all his experience and his recent victory in the French national championships, should have a role to play in South African rugby. For many it was a given when Van Rooyen summarily dismissed him from consideration when the Bok coaching job was being discussed earlier in the year.

This happened at the same meeting that Van Rooyen told the then SA Rugby board member Morne du Plessis that Jake White should not be considered as Bok coach as he was an under-21 coach, which reading between the lines meant that under-21 was White’s level. Before we get too enthusiastic about White we must remember that we are only three test matches into the new international season. There have been undeniable improvements, but we South Africans know how quickly all that can be forgotten and the pendulum can turn in the opposite direction if the Boks suffer just one big defeat.

For now though we can say that the initial results indicate that White was the right choice and that eventually, after the president’s choice of candidates were overlooked or declared themselves unavailable, a decent Bok coach was appointed.

But it remains a glaring weakness of South African rugby as a whole, and not just Van Rooyen, that it appears so incapable of removing itself from petty politics, personal differences and xenophobia when busying itself with the important task of finding a new Bok coach.

This is a problem in other areas as well. For instance, if there is one man who can really help with the South African bid for the Rugby World Cup bid in 2011, it is Rian Oberholzer, who as a high-ranking member of the IRB was on the committee that decided to award the new World Cup to France.

Oberholzer knows better than anyone what is needed to make a bid successful. Excluding him from the process because you want to purge yourself completely of all memories of the old regime is petty and does not make good business sense when you consider what Oberholzer can offer in the way of expertise.

If Van Rooyen means it when he says he has learned that everyone, including one presumes those outside of his own cosy little enclave of supporters, should be canvassed and consulted for their views and tapped for what contribution they can make, then it is a massive step in the right direction.

Seeing the ABSA Currie Cup competition starts this weekend, Van Rooyen should also then take the logical next step, which is to consult all those who are unhappy with the way the decision to introduce a two tier domestic competition was overturned.

There are several reasons why the Boks seem healthier at the moment than they were previously. But one of them is that young players like Schalk Burger, Fourie du Preez and Jacques Cronje made an easier step-up to Super 12 and then international level than some of their predecessors for the simple reason that they were introduced to top class rugby in a more competitive strength versus strength Currie Cup environment.

The benefits of strength versus strength have been listed in this column often enough, and Van Rooyen seems to know that the system as it was constituted last year has value as he enthused quite gushingly at the ABSA Currie Cup launch last week about the excitement generated by the 2003 competition.

So why then are we still apparently headed back to a 14 team Currie Cup competition in 2005? Why is there talk of abolishing the two tiers? And what will the addition of teams like Morroco and Namibia to the Currie Cup competition do for the strength of South African rugby, which is what the tournament should be all about?

These are questions which Van Rooyen must deliver an effective answer to if he really has the strength of South African rugby at heart and if he really wants to see the current promising Springbok team develop into the great combination Os du Randt believes it can become.

Springbok success can only be consistently sustained if the administration makes the right decisions and gets the players to believe they are part of a professional structure that is professionally run.

That confidence in the man in charge can bring out the best in the players has been proved under White in the past few weeks. The players believe in this coach, and so far they have delivered performances that advertise this belief.

But issues such as player payments will remain problematic if not dealt with effectively, and being told they are pathetic and not worth the money they are being paid, which is essentially what Van Rooyen did in a Sunday newspaper report earlier this year, is not the way to build confidence.

The current Bok team needs to be kept together if it is to realise its potential, but still there are persistent rumours that several of the top players, without the security of a national contract to keep them loyal to South African rugby, are talking to overseas clubs, most notably the London Tribe project.

I don’t know about you, but suddenly the prospect of losing a whole host of top players because they are unhappy with the way they are remunerated and treated as the game’s major stake-holder seems so much sadder than it would have three weeks ago.