THE pyrotechnics at King's Park Durban may have been a world away from watching the Green Machine's pack wading through the mud of Mansfield Park, but the Springboks' gameplan yesterday was instantly identifiable as the brand of ten-man rugby once played down Hawick way. If they'd taken to the field wearing bugger-grip sideburns, flares and tie-dye t-shirts they couldn't have been any more retro.
This was South African rugby in its oldest and purest form, based around a bruising front five, a tricky scrum-half in Fourie du Preez and a No 10 in Ruan Pienaar who could smack the ball into the stratosphere from a standing start. It was like a Naa
s Botha tribute gala.
The Springboks came with a simple plan based around their anticipated domination of the lineout. For all the Lions' problems at the scrum and the breakdown, it was in this arena where the game was won and lost.
South Africa's mastery of the lineout meant that they could play the percentages and with Pienaar's deft kicking allied to young full-back Francois Steyn's siegegun boot, that's precisely what they did. Assured of winning their own lineouts and with a reasonable expectation of poaching some Lions' throw-ins, the Boks could play to their strengths, kicking for position and territory and pressuring the Lions.
Their sense of purpose contrasted to the Lions aimless punting to Steyn as they tried to avoid kicking the ball into touch. Yet neither Lee Byrne nor fly-half Stephen Jones were accurate enough to put any great pressure on South Africa's back three, with Steyn invariably left with plenty of time to field their kicks and return them with interest.
If Steyn was good, Pienaar was majestic. The hyperbole that suggests he's "the Tiger Woods of rugby" is faintly silly, but yesterday the consistency, accuracy and range of his kicks was remarkable. His grubber into the corner late on was a thing of beauty, as was the late touch-finder banged out of his 22 which marched the Lions back to halfway.
Throughout he kicked with precision to the corners, often managing to keep the ball just in touch but knowing that if it crossed the whitewash it wasn't a disaster. The tactic almost yielded tries on several occasions, most notably when JP Pietersen almost beat Ugo Monye to a neat little dap on the right touchline, and then when Pienaar's delicately-placed kick left Tommy Bowe in no man's land with little choice but to cough up a penalty.
As the Lions' consolidated their reputation for ineptitude at the lineout – their first throw was snaffled by Victor Matfield, the third was thrown to Gethin Jenkins at the back against 6ft 5in Pierre Spies – so the Boks used the boot more and their centres less.
Nor was Pienaar the only Bok who kicked dreamily. Du Preez's well-judged box kicks always gave the chasing player a decent chance of reclaiming the ball, as did Steyn's howitzer up-and-unders. They were virtually faultless, with Pienaar also punishing the tourists with five goal-kicks from six.
The Springboks kicked as well as the Lions kicked badly. It wasn't just at goal, where Jones' two early penalty misses put the Lions under pressure, but out of the hand too. Byrne, Monye, Bowe and Jones all conspicuously failed to put the home side under the cosh.
While the Springboks had an effective gameplan and stuck to it well, the Lions' weakness at the lineout was exacerbated by their weak kicking game. A cameo in the last five minutes encapsulates the whole game. The Lions were five points down and won a penalty deep in Bok territory, with Jones being given the ball to kick them right into the corner. Only he didn't – he shanked the ball to the edge of the 22, and then the Lions lost the lineout on their own throw.
The Lions may have roared back at the death, but in that one passage of play you had the whole game in a nutshell.
