World Cup victory or not, De Villiers should go

The Springboks received a healthy dose of confidence after winning their last Tri-Nations fixture against a weakened All Blacks in Port Elizabeth. Having shaken off the evident rust against Australia the week before, South Africa went back to what they know best by playing it tight and using Morne Steyn’s boot to keep the scoreboard moving whenever they visited the New Zealand 22.

While the Springboks are heading to New Zealand in a mode that now mirrors the mantra of under-promise and over-perform, once the tournament is over South African rugby will be at a crossroads. A host of senior players are retiring and a new leadership group will be taking charge. A new captain will be required and equally important is the question of who will be the person to take the Springboks forward as coach once the World Cup is over.

Peter de Villiers’s reign as Springbok supremo hasn’t been smooth sailing. In 2009, the accepted interpretation of rugby’s laws at the breakdown and the tackle area benefited the Springboks, with victory in the Tri-Nations and success against the visiting British and Irish Lions. In the other three years since De Villiers took over, the Springboks have been manoeuvred on the field and Saru’s PR department must have aged a decade as De Villiers has provided the media with constant misplaced musings via his personal war with the English language. The odd malapropism here and there would be passable, but De Villiers has shown he is his own man when wandering off Saru’s PR reservation.

The man from Paarl has defended eye-gouging, suggested last year’s losses to New Zealand were part of a conspiracy and shopped around for new assistants even though Dick Muir and Gary Gold were still on the payroll. Certain elements of the South African media have never liked him while our Southern Hemisphere neighbours don’t respect him. Brendan Cannon, the former Wallaby hooker, called him a clown and a puppet but was made to apologise. Since when did a South African coach care about what a former Australian player thought about him? Saru threatened to deny Fox Sports access to the Springboks unless he apologised, which I believe made South Africa look even weaker in the eyes of the Australian media.

In the early days of his reign I also called for his head, but softened since, giving De Villiers the benefit of the doubt. Three years later, there isn’t any left on the rope.

Beyond being a marketing barrel of nitroglycerine, on the field the Springboks haven’t evolved beyond the team that won the 2007 World Cup. Literally, the majority of the squad going to New Zealand consists of the same men who won the title in Paris four years ago. Experience is very important in tough matches where the margins of error are extremely small but throughout the entire tournament question marks will hang over South Africa’s ability to go the distance before the petrol tank hits the dreaded E.

While De Villiers’s faith in his players is admirable to an extent, he hasn’t shown the forward-thinking necessary to ensure South Africa have the best possible chance of defending their title. Andries Bekker’s injury has shown the Springbok’s lack of depth at lock, while Bryan Habana would’ve been dropped some time ago if he played for any other nation considering how poor his form has been over the last few seasons, excluding his performance against the All Blacks in PE. The whiff of desperation within the South African rugby intelligentsia for him to hit the heights he established four years ago is a vicious circle, Habana has often appeared so desperate to prove his detractors wrong that it impedes the way he plays.

The most quintessential problem that might define the De Villiers era was keeping John Smit as captain. Bismarck du Plessis’s unhappiness at being substituted against the All Blacks, while disappointing from a discipline perspective, was an apt illustration of De Villiers’s consistency in selection working against his stated ambitions.

While it is far too late to change course now, the end of the 2009 season was the time for De Villiers to make the tough decision to replace Smit with the more effective Du Plessis and anoint a new skipper. It’s the white elephant in the room, and though Smit has been a wonderful servant to his country, his departure overseas along with that of his experienced colleagues Victor Matfield, Bakkies Botha and Fourie du Preez after the conclusion of the World Cup will be a needed chasm within the Springbok set-up. So the team can forge a new identity from the Jake White-era — De Villiers has perpetuated the same playing style and used the same players, even when their form has been extremely poor.

De Villiers’s failure to evolve and learn from his mistakes is his most damning mistake since becoming Springbok head coach.

If De Villiers were to be reappointed, regardless of whether the Springboks win the World Cup (and I don’t believe they will as much as South Africa wills for it), it would be an extreme error of judgement from Saru to continue to put faith in a professional that too often and almost too predictably hasn’t exhibited the high standards demanded of a Springbok coach.

South Africa isn’t an easy nation to lead considering the blurred line of sports and politics, but De Villiers hasn’t shown the acumen necessary to balance on this tightrope. His departure, along with the senior players mentioned above and the rest of the current coaching staff, is the necessary break Springbok rugby needs to start again. So it can begin the climb once more from the base of our expectations, with a fresh body and mind. So that once again the Springboks become a glowing symbol of what South Africa is capable of when we work together for a common goal.

Even if South Africa win the World Cup, it will be despite De Villiers and not because of him. That isn’t a description befitting a Springbok coach.