What transpired following South Africa’s penultimate Castle Lager Rugby Championship game was significantly more perplexing than the outcome. headlines like “Argentina continue to win the championship.” Really? To accomplish that, they must win in Nelspruit by a significant margin. Which planet do you inhabit?
The Championship trophy is effectively coming to South Africa for the first time since 2019 and only the second time in the tournament’s history in its current form due to the one bonus point earned from the admittedly unexpected loss to the Pumas at the weekend and the fact that the winners were only awarded four points for the result. The Boks are now under pressure to respond, even if only to meet their own high standards and the expectations of the rugby public, so the Pumas may have a chance of winning in Nelspruit and the Mbombela Stadium game has an advantage. However, given that the teams are separated by five points on the log, the Pumas can only draw level, which would require them to deny the Boks even a single bonus point. It would be naive to think that Nelspruit won’t see the Boks inaugurated as Championship champions in addition to World Cup champions. If you add in the other requirement for the Pumas: at the moment, the Boks have a 37-point advantage in points, so the Pumas will have to break a winning margin record against the world champions on a surface where they typically perform well. They did appear to be capable of that for a brief time in Santiago, as who scores 26 points against the Boks? Our pre-match assessment that the Pumas have become the French of the 1970s and 1980s and the 1999 World Cup semifinal is supported by their phenomenal and freakish time to score those points. that is, unpredictability and danger. The game wasn’t all that big. But here’s the thing: the Boks would still have won if coach Rassie Erasmus had kept Handre Pollard on the field as a part of the midfield when he gave Manie Libbok his first playing time in years, which is understandable given Libbok’s lack of all-around skill. If Libbok had kicked, that would have been the story this morning: the Boks won the game despite allowing 26 points without a response. We would have said that was how much they have grown. As reigning double RWC champions, the Boks were expected to win every game in Santiago, even though they didn’t. However, Erasmus’s risk, which he acknowledged later when he stated that his selection was always a risk for an away game in Argentina, was not nearly as significant as is being made out to be. They had the financial means to take chances against the Pumas. They did this, and while they lost, they will still win the Championship. They have won, and they have done so while expanding the depth by casting a wider selection net than ever before. There are no ifs or buts about that.