superBul
Since I did not watch the game let me rather deal with statistics. I don’t know whether this will support Heyneke Meyer or not because I will post them as I source them. You sift through it and make with it whatever you will.
Four Great Springbok tries
A tough tour suddenly got a whole lot tougher. This was the game England had to win because South Africa were undercooked and because England had to build on the momentum and confidence gained from the Six Nations. But it did not go to plan. Not remotely.
England are braced for a physical onslaught when they take on South Africa in the first Test of a three-match series, England prop Dan Cole said on Tuesday.
South Africa will not use their lack of preparation time as an excuse before their three-Test home series against England, wing Bryan Habana said on Tuesday.
The IRB Pacific Nations Cup 2012 gets underway on Tuesday, June 5 at Nagoya’s Mizuho Park Rugby Ground, one of three venues for this year’s tournament.
Samoa play Tonga in the opening game of the double-header match day, followed by hosts Japan who start their title defence against Fiji.
Last might we all felt that the South African game plan was poor and uninspiring. Perhaps we need to be just a little less reflex and hot under the collar in branding South Africans who support various New Zealand rugby causes instantly traitorous. This article by Rob Houwing , sums up my thoughts of the game too.
Could there be at least some element of such people throwing their weight behind teams from that country because they simply seem to play a more vibrant and joyous game so much of the time?
Nine uncapped players have been included in the Springbok squad of 32 for the Castle Incoming Tour against England, named on Saturday in Pretoria by SARU CEO Jurie Roux and Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer.
Former Springbok coach Nick Mallett says he is concerned that national coach Heyneke Meyer’s philosophy could impede player creativity.
Mallet had a lot to say this week here is some of it.
Andries Bekker has a long way to go before he can be talked about in the same breath as South Africa’s greatest lineout specialist, Victor Matfield.
The Bulls have made two changes to the team that lost to the Chiefs in Hamilton last week, ahead of their clash with the Stormers in Pretoria on Saturday.
There is some confusion among local Super Rugby coaches over where they stand with regards to players who have been selected for the national Under-20 squad about to contest the Junior World Cup in Stellenbosch and Bellville which starts next week.
Remarkable team the Highlanders. Just when you think you can count on counting them out, you can’t.
That was the case on Saturday night when they humbled a Bulls team which had started the weekend as Super Rugby’s competition front-runners but ended it with a 16-11 loss. They will be re-evaluating their form ahead of this weekend’s game against the Chiefs.
With the exception of the Highlanders gritty victory against the Bulls, every winner in Week 13 was higher on the competition log table than their vanquished rivals, meaning that the title hopefuls tightened their grip on potential Super Rugby Final’s Series qualification.
A while back I offered to manage a selection competition where we at Rugby-Talk could show our knowledge of SA rugby and who can read Heyneke Meyer’s mind the best. Bok Barometer was the driving force in this idea. The first Test is on the 9th of June, less than 4 weeks away.
LIONS president Kevin de Klerk believes next week’s crunch meeting between the South African Rugby Union and franchise bosses would “draw a line in the sand” on the Super Rugby participation saga. In January the Port Elizabeth-based Southern Kings were guaranteed their place in the 2013 Super Rugby tournament by unanimous decision at a General Council meeting of SARU.
Vodacom Super Rugby has been attracting bumper TV audiences as it reached the halfway mark at the weekend. Average viewership has increased by 15% on 2011, while viewership of South African derbies averages 685,581, making it easily the most popular sporting event on DSTV’s premium bouquet – apart from Springbok Test matches.
This is a briefing document on South African participation in the 2013 Vodacom Super Rugby competition.
I have no idea what SANZAR thought they were doing when they appointed Bryce Lawrence to the match between the Reds and the Crusaders at the weekend. Maybe they had taken a blow too many to the head. But the officiating of this game was an accident waiting to happen.
Two of the most slippery and mercurial scrumhalves in Super Rugby will lock horns in Sydney on Friday.
The match-up between the Bulls’ Springbok Francois Hougaard and Sarel Pretorius, the former Cheetahs try-scoring factor who has made a new home for himself at the Waratahs this season, will be one of the highlights of the encounter.
Ruan Pienaar’s Man of the Match-performance against Edinburgh in Saturday’s 22-19 Heineken Cup semi-final victory has made the Ulster scrum-half the most talked-about player in European rugby right now.
Prop Rayno Gerber and loose forward Gerrit-Jan van Velze has been called into the Vodacom Bulls touring squad in Australia. Continue reading
The winner of the 15th Vodacom Cup will be crowned in a few weeks’ time, but this weekend’s quarterfinal action takes place in Kimberley, Nelspruit, Durban and Cape Town.
Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer left Cape Town a happy man after overseeing three very successful Planning Camps over the past three weeks.
As the Lions lurch from one defeat to another, I must admit to being baffled at the outpouring of sympathy for them the more it looks like they are headed for relegation at the end of the Super Rugby season.
The Big 5 priorities have once against been summarised after ten weeks of Super Rugby, and the indication is that the shape of the game looks sound according to SANZAR Game Manager Lyndon Bray.
Maintaining the momentum around agreed scrum outcomes and keeping the time and space around the field ensures that we maintain a focus on attack.
We are
reaching the halfway mark of the 2012 Super Rugby season, these are some of my thoughts so far.
The match is 80-minutes long but the ball is not in play all of those 80 minutes. There are stoppages, and in fact the ball is rarely in play for even half the time.
Every week readers of BOKzine (SA Rugby’s Electronic Magazine) are given the opportunity to ask questions of South African rugby personalities. This time was Heyneke Meyer’s turn.
A total of 45 players from the Vodacom Bulls and The Sharks have been invited to the second Springbok Planning Camp, which will be held in Pretoria next week.
Former Springbok coach Peter de Villiers has approached the South African Rugby Union (SARU) about possible work.
Some Super rugby stats to feast on.
While the Bulls and Cheetahs were winners on Republic’s soil over the weekend, it was the Stormers who impressed with an iron-like display against the Highlanders where the battle of the Conference leaders went firmly the way of the South Africans.
The completed weekend of action saw the Highlanders dethroned at home, which meant the Chiefs headed to the top of the New Zealand Conference table courtesy of winning their first match on the road in Perth.