The Boks shouldn’t commit to a shootout against the Wallabies tomorrow but, without the sniper rifles required to fire up a lethal percentage game, they may have no choice.
With Fourie du Preez and Ruan Pienaar out injured, Francois Hougaard will feed the scrum. The all-action Bulls halfback is an inspirational competitor who will challenge the Wallabies as a linebreak threat, but who does not have the boot to keep the opposing back three on their toes.
Speaking of the Aussie back three ... like the Super Rugby champion Waratahs, the Wallabies have a bloke at fullback called Israel Folau. By rugby standards, he is a freak. Players capable of breaching defensive lines on their own are in extremely rare supply. Folau is joined by All Blacks gamebreaker Sonny Bill Williams on the exclusive short-list.
The game-changing phenom allows Australia to laugh off any idea of kicking the ball.
The Boks don’t have that luxury. With Hougaard at No9, they are also too short-staffed to mount an aerial assault, despite flyhalf Handré Pollard’s tactical expertise.
Consequently, Bok coach Heyneke Meyer appears to have resigned himself to taking the Wallabies on at their own game.
Hougaard is capable and eager to exploit gaps around the fringes, while Oupa Mohoje will boost the pack with speed.
Meyer rightly believes that Bismarck du Plessis, Bakkies Botha, Schalk Burger and JP Pietersen have the experience to close out a tight contest, but experience is seldom the top priority for impact players – the 270-cap quartet running the risk of becoming redundant reinforcements if the Wallabies take an early lead.
In such an eventuality, Meyer will wish he’d started Burger ahead of Mohoje, Pietersen instead of Jan Serfontein or Cornal Hendricks, and that he’d kept Lood de Jager on the bench instead of Botha. - The Star