Boks rugby coach Heyneke Meyer and Bafana Bafana interim coach Steve Komphela begin their respective assignments today in their first international “must win” games, with the eyes of the nation – and of critics – firmly on them.
Both the Springboks against England and Bafana Bafana against Botswana need to hit the ground running today to impress sports mad South Africans, who will want to see if the two men can handle the pressure of their roles.
While Komphela put up his hand for soccer’s toughest job in an interview on Friday, Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula lambasted the tendency to celebrate mediocrity, citing woeful Bafana Bafana as a prime example.
Mbalula was speaking after he met the newly formed Eminent Persons Group on Transformation, which includes international olympic committee executive member Sam Ramsamy, football club owner and businesswoman Ria Ledwaba, and sports science fundi Tim Noakes.
Komphela on Friday said it was a privilege to coach the national side, and that he would be prepared to fill any role assigned to him by the SA Football Association (Safa).
“To me this is not a job, to me this is duty for the nation,” said Komphela in Gaborone before their Group A 2014 Fifa World Cup qualifier against Botswana today.
On Friday, he made the shortlist of five coaches that Safa will interview from next week alongside Gordon Igesund, Gavin Hunt, Shakes Mashaba and Neil Tovey.
A survey by consumer insights company Pondering Panda on Friday claimed soccer fans want Moroka Swallows coach Igesund to be appointed the new coach.
Nearly one in two respondents (46 percent) are in favour of Igesund taking over.
Komphela cited his experience at the highest level in a clear attempt to spell out to Safa why he should be the man for the job.
The former Bafana captain was capped 24 times between 1992 and 1995, with 17 matches as captain.
“I’ve worked with (former Bafana coaches) Stuart Baxter, Carlos Queiroz and Carlos Alberto Parreira.”
The 44-year-old former SA Under-23 coach explained the pressure that came with the job. “This chair has never been cold; you sit here and it’s heated all the time,” he said.
In Durban, Meyer was feeling the heat, with Cope leader Mosiuoa Lekota saying the major issue “crying out for attention” was the wider inclusion of elite black players in rugby at the national level.
Lekota said the Eastern Cape, which has 280 000 rugby players – 43 percent of all rugby players in SA – was “still out in the cold with no coherent resolution or mechanism for their inclusion”.
He was commenting on the controversial team selection of Meyer, saying it was “problematic” that Meyer had selected 103 players to Springbok camps to choose a team, but not one of them was from the three unions in the Eastern Cape.
Although the Springboks have only had four training sessions under Meyer before taking on an England team who finished second in this year’s Six Nations, new captain Jean de Villiers said the week of preparation had been good.
“The camps that Heyneke had during the year with the franchises have really worked and we are reaping the rewards now.”
Much has been made of the time the Springboks have been together before the series with most of the players involved with their franchises last weekend.
But England were not buying any perception SA could be caught short.
“They have had a couple of preparation camps and they have a coaching team that has worked together a lot,” England forwards coach Graham Rowntree said.
“Will their limited game time together be an advantage for us? I’m not sure. They have a lot of players who have played together for a long time.”
Rowntree said England was looking forward to the physical intensity that the Springboks bring to the field.
“King’s Park is an iconic stadium and it doesn’t get much bigger than this… we have been watching the pattern of play from the Super 15, but all teams have a few tricks up their sleeves,” said Rowntree.
“We’ve all seen what The Beast can do, Bismarck has an exceptional edge and Jannie is brilliant. It will be a big battle,” he said.
Both teams will be blooding players with openside flanker Marcell Coetzee and locks Juandre Kruger and Eben Etzebeth winning their first caps for SA, while England hand debuts to loosehead prop Joe Marler and flanker Tom Johnson.
- Pretoria News Weekend