leeubok

In general the balance of this team isn't right and there's just not a good vibe around this team.

Duane is injured at the moment, otherwise he would've been at 8 and ww on the bench or 7 (like AC used them against Ireland)

Good assessment there mntboy. I would add our tight 5 as another reason why our backs are getting crap ball. Beast is also there on reputation, Etzebeth as good as he is, is lazy. Psdt should replace lood and mostert should be on the bench. Unfortunately I doubt AC has the goons to do any of the above.

Busy watching the game now. Bok rugby is in deep trouble! AC needs to clean out all the dead wood, starting with his captain. I'm worried however about our coaching team, I don't think they have the know how to fix this bok team. AC's province record speaks for itself. Stick doesn't even have a coaching record. AB's and aus going to murder the Boks..

"breakdown mid point" - What the hell? So you can only play the ball if it is in your half of the pile of bodies. They are probably trying to speed the game up, but to me it seems like it is just getting more and more complicated. And subject to more frustration as every ref will blow it differently

Really? Where are they implementing this? If so, rugby just becomes more like rugby league. They should stop fiddling with the rules, the game is already over complicated

Well he actually surprised me a bit today by dropping De Jong from the match day 23 completely, and sticking with the rest of the team. Bringing M. Steyn back onto the bench tells me he has zero confidence in Jantjies though. But why not start Jesse at the back then and let Goosen cover 10 from the bench? At least Goosen is young and can provide options for years to come, whereas we all know M. Steyn's time has come and gone. I seriously don't know how he can justify Louw ahead of Kriel. Captain Teletubbie also needs to go as soon as possible, make way for Marx please! No one would dare pinching his nuts or kick him in the face!

What makes McCaw's record even more noteworthy is he's a loosie always up front in the thick of things, putting his body on the line. Completely different to a wing putting in 1 or 2 tackles a game and just going for intercept tries.

To a degree, yes. A coach has to understand each player's weaknesses and strengths, and either play according to that or pick players according to the gameplan you intend playing. Ackermann is playing the running style at the Lions because he's said that's the type of players he has. AC I think is stuck between different plans, because he picked a running/attacking flyhalf but expecting him to play more conservative and to a specific structure But you are right, we just love having a go at the bok coach, don't we

Goosen won't be moved to 12, although I agree it wouldn't be a bad experiment. But if AC realises 12 is a problem, why not pick the in form Rohan jv Rensburg? I have a feeling he's going to drop Mapoe and play his beloved WP pair of Duh Duh and OFFSIDE OFFSIDE, HOLDING HOLDING!!! De Jong Jantjies, eish I don't know what's going on with him. Maybe AC needs to get Ackers there to manage him. Because at the moment it would seem like AC is breaking Jantjies (just like he did when Jantjies was on loan to WP a few years back). I hate saying this, but we miss Lambie and Pollard

Agree with you regarding the captaincy. But why is SA always re-building? Why can't we expect the best players in SA to just play some decent rugby from the start? The AB's have lost McCaw, Nonu, Smith etc but they've never changed gears and just keep on bulldozing every team in their path. And lets be honest here, this is the same Jaguars team that played super rugby. So they wore different jerseys on Saturday, does that suddenly make them better players? Are they not giving 100% in super rugby? The experience debate doesn't sit well with me. No use having played 100 tests but you're slow, unfit and out of form. I'd rather have a young, hungry and in form player! AKA Low - Kriel, Habana - Skosan, Beast - Koch/Kitsoff, Strauss - Marx

Left the house after 10:00 on Sunday, it was nice and cool so I thought I should be ok riding at that time. Beeeg mistake! Only did 22km but with 684m of climbing over rough terrain and the sun started to cook me. I was buggered the rest of the day and had a moerse headache that evening Bivane river where it flows into the Pongola

Not a very good game from the Boks today. In my opinion it starts with the coach who doesn't know what he's doing and a leader who shouldn't be in the team in the first place. Strauss has been absolutely pathetic this year. Sure, he finds his jumpers and he can hook a ball in the scrums, but that's his sole contribution in every game. Then AC keeps picking duh duh and jdj who hasn't played 15man rugby in months. When rohan jv rensburg is in the form of his life. Oupa was quiet at first but didn't have a bad game. Flouw was missing in action again. AB's will smash us if we don't improve a lot, and do so very quickly! Next wknd the argies might just klap us at home..

Well it's impressive if he's only 20 yrs old and beating the likes of the other better known guys in SA. Let's hope he has a solid race at the Olympics, and maybe in future he'll be up there challenging for medals!

Ok I'll crawl back into my cave now. Thanks

Apologies if I've been living in a cave and not keeping up to date with the local XCO scene, but who is Alan Hatherly and when did he arrive on the scene? What happened to the likes of Phil Buys, Max Knox and those okes?

Some good points there Mntboy. At 1 I wouldn't mind Kitshoff, but Nyakane has done very little to warrant a spot. Bissie - Eish I don't know. I'll admit I haven't seen him play in ages. But I don't like his attitude (I'm bigger than the game) and I just feel there are several young and talented options at home that could serve the boks just as well. PSDT - I only went for Mostert because I'm biased towards the lions. But agree that PSDT is probably first choice Habana - again, I can't say that I've seen him play lately. Last I saw of him was in the WC. Again, same as Bissie, I think we've got enough local talent to fill that spot. Habana can enjoy his retirement package oversees. Goosen and Fransie - could be useful as utility backs, they can both cover several backline positions. Might be good to put 1 of them at fullback. I'm not a big fan of selecting overseas based guys where we've got good talent at home. I've probably said this before but the experience argument doesn't do it for me. HM's experienced boks in last year's WC proves my point. We will never get all the franchises to play the same style. AC must just decide on his style and then select the players he thinks will fit best. No use selecting all the lions players and you tell them to either kick the ball or run straight into defenders. I'm not convinced AC is the right guy for the job yet. And his assistants doesn't inspire much confidence either. If he had a Mitchell or Jones as an assistant it could work well

Well at least AC has started to correct some mistakes his predecessor made. HM didn't include any Lions players in his WC team last year. NOT ONE. NADA. ZILCH. F0KKOL. My only worry is as I've said before, AC's gameplan will surely be the same as his WP one. And we all know it was built around solid defence, nowhere near the running rugby we want today. So picking Lions players but then instructing them to play a different gameplan will be counter productive. If you take the lions team, where would you make changes for the boks? 1. D Smit. Been scrumming like a man possessed. Beast is over the hill and seem more interested in arguing with the ref 2. Marx. No contest here. Pity AC had a brainfart and made teletubbie his captain 3. Julian. No contest here 4. Etzebeth. 5. Mostert or PSDT would do 6. Kriel. No contest here 7. Open. I'd pick Duane here 8. WW. Although Duane is most probably AC's first choice. 9. Faf. No contest here 10. Elton. Has now proven he's got what it takes. 11. Skosan. Has improved immensely over the last few years, one of the fastest wings and best finishers around 12. Rohan. So much better than Duh Duh and forms a good combination with Mapoe 13. Mapoe. Keep the combination with Rohan 14. Combrinck. No contest here 15. Open for suggestions. Jesse Kriel? As long as it is NOT Willie! Vd Walt or Andries Coetzee wouldn't let a team down either. I may be biased as a Lions supporter, but in all honestly I think there are only 3 or so players that would improve this team. My team is also picked purely on merit.

Very true. But I see AC praises the stormers attack in the same breath as the Lions. The more he talks the more I realize how doff he is. We all want more Lions in the bok team, but actually the situation is not very healthy (having only 1 decent SA team). You can't take almost the entire Lions team and give them a new coach and different gameplan and expect the same results. AC has to get the Lions coaches involved somehow Lions have finally found that balance between attack, defence and tactical kicking. I think we have a real shot at winning the title, although needless to say it's not going to be easy

A mate of mine from another park here in KZN was out training for the Imfolozi challenge a couple of years ago, when an eagle dropped a mamba next to him on the road. If a mamba falls on you from the sky, you just know it's your time to go...

Eish, with WW and Ross out I'm a bit nervous about this game. The Lions' bench might be a bit of a weakness. If it's close at the end we better hope the altitude and travel catches up with them, because we really don't have anyone on the bench that can make a big positive impact

This has probably been debated to death, and I really don't want to start a whole discussion on it now. But I just want to say that if they want more black cricketers in the national team, start at the grassroots and improve rural schools, and help kids with talent get into the good cricketing schools (like Rabada). Don't enforce it from the top down. I am certainly no fan of Dimuny or Behardien. Duminy used to be very good, but the problem with especially cricket is that guys stay in the team purely on reputation. And Behardien is too inconsistent. He scores some runs maybe once in 15 games, sometimes it wins us the game if he's lucky. He doesn't even bowl anymore, and Duminy not much either. And how can you have guys like Steyn and Morkel but you REST them all the time? Aaarg let me stop here otherwise I'll go on forever! Domingo must fall! Domingo must fall!

There's an email doing the rounds, from one or the other outdoor magazine I think, of these tourists staying in a "tree house" somewhere. They counted 6 cape cobras IN and around their accommodation. Needless to say they asked to be housed somewhere else...

Well, I'm done with SA cricket for time being. Our national side is clearly not being picked on merit. And I'm referring to okes like Duminy and Behardien here. Our coach is like a fish out of water, he's taken us from no1 in tests to what, 5 or 6 now? The last ODI I watched 8/11 of our players were of colour. Which is fine, most of them are there on merit. But now CSA still implement official "targets". Even poor AB doesn't perform when he plays for SA anymore. I wish he would open his mouth and tell the world what he thinks of the politics in our sport. He's revered in India, and India control world cricket. So maybe they'll sort CSA out?

Busy fixing a bike?