South Africa vs Italy

[Incredible Schalk]

completely butchered two tries near the end but what this showed was..Ndungane is rubbbish,Steyn is definetely not a 10 and finally that the Bok players havent been listening to PDV when he said to play with their heads up. If they play like that the All Blacks will pummel them, will Smit and co be back?

 

[Bull]

What a poor match. The Bokke didn't seem like they wanted to play, Italy were really only spoiling the ball the whole time. I thought the ref should have given a number of yellow cards for all the negative play. Steyn was okay, De Villiers was quite, was Bobo on the field? Ndungane was okay-ish, Habana did pretty well and Jantjes was ****.

I hope everyone can see now that the Beast can scrum for ****, he got owned by the Italians 3rd string prop(s). Time to bring in Heinke van der Merwe.

Lot's of work to do before the Tri-nations.

 

[silent_shadow]

I feel sorry for the poor crowd that turned up to watch this. Imagine having to pay lots of money to sit in a cold, wet Newlands and watch a lackluster performance from SA.
Mujati played well when he came on. In fact the scrum was at its best with Mujati at 3 and CJ at 1. It's probably because Cj isn't a tighthead.
Ndungane was pretty poor, although he didn't get much ball and the conditions weren't suitable. Brits played very well when he came on on debut. When Grant came on the backline actually got some ball and moved around a bit and it was great having Steyn at 15 with his big boot and counterattacking.

 

[Incredible Schalk]

On the positive side though Van Niekerk was superb and on balance i would have him ahead of Spies. Brits as you say also made a big impression when he came on, Du Plessis was great again as was Matfield.

 

[silent_shadow]

Big Joe did play well when he came on. Kankowski will probably miss out then. It's a shame as he hasn't played much, but he should've made the most of that time. He's also not very good in wet conditions and we could have a lot of that in New Zealand.
I'm really worried about our scrum though. I don't think anyone knows what the best front row is, that's the problem with rotation.

 

[Tamarro]

you imagine however if italy didn't have all these absences.......

let's say it however, they have both played badly: south africa has too underestimated the adversary and italy has not been enough aggressive.....

 

[springbok90]

i was a little worried that we couldnt pile a few more points on against italy, although holding them scoreless is good to, cant for the tri-nations then we can see whos really good

 

[Boggle]

Well I think the fact that we took only one shot at goal altered the score a bit, but then against Italy I guess they we're trying for as many tries as possible rather then taking the 3 points when it presents itself.



Bobo was so utter rubbish I allmost shat myself.

He was just horrible, not one good move during the entire game (apart from a tackle) I'm -sure- we've got some better partners for De Villiers, even with the absense of Fourie and Jacobs.



It's a shame about Kankowski, he's first Bok game under Pieter De villiers and he doesn' get to show much due to one of the worst looking tackles I've ever seen, it looked as if though his body snapped in half when he was hit, made my skin crawl.

 

[Steve-o]

Unconvincing <-- just about sums it up...

Thank goodness the whole SA now knows that Bobo is ****. He never was Bok quality, never will be. Barrett should be in the mix at 12, De Villiers at 13 or even the other around. Or even De Villiers at 12 and Steyn at 13.
Until Jannie Du Plessis and Heinke van der Merwe get selected, our scrum is gonna suck.

This whole post is a case of de jevu (sp?)

 

[Gavin]

i was a little worried that we couldnt pile a few more points on against italy, although holding them scoreless is good to, cant for the tri-nations then we can see whos really good [/b]

To be fair the conditions didn't really suit a free flowing game. Bobo played rubbish and Steyn kicked the ball far too much.

 

[Steve-o]

i was a little worried that we couldnt pile a few more points on against italy, although holding them scoreless is good to, cant for the tri-nations then we can see whos really good
[/b]

In some ways I share your concern but I really don't think it's a coincidence that the Boks scored 2 quick and relentless tries in under 20-25 minutes in all 3 Tests.
Atleast that's what I hope.

 

[silent_shadow]

JdV's centre partner is really worrying me. I think NZ will target Jacobs if he plays and his defense has never convinced me. Maybe he'll be good as an impact player but I think we need someone else there. I'd actually like Grant to be tried out there. His defense is solid, he knows JdV well and I like the idea of 2 flyhalves at 10 and 12. But then he couldn't really be used as a backup flyhalf. Steyn wouldn't be too bad, but he still doesn't pass enough.
JdV is an outside centre, he's got the pace and the creativity, he can play as a wing, but not a flyhalf. Doubt they'll move him there unfortunately.

Here's a backline I'd like too see, but probably won't:
15 - Steyn/Percy
14 - ?
13 - JdV
12 - Grant/Steyn
11 - Habana
10 - Butch
9 - Januarie

Our defense would be rock solid with the exception of the right wings who I'm unsure of. And we'd have a good mixture of dependable (Januarie, Butch, Grant, Percy) and flair players (Steyn, Habana, JdV, hopefully 14)
I really wish we had Barritt or M. Steyn I think they could slot in at 12 quite well.

 

[Steve-o]

Not sure why you want Steyn at 12 if you don't rate his passing? I know Meyer Bosman was in the 30 man squad before he got injured, I rate him highly at 12, and he has played 10 for the Cheetahs many times.

 

[silent_shadow]

Not sure why you want Steyn at 12 if you don't rate his passing? I know Meyer Bosman was in the 30 man squad before he got injured, I rate him highly at 12, and he has played 10 for the Cheetahs many times. [/b]

Well we don't have many options there. Steyn at least played very well at 12 in the WC and he did actually pass the ball occasionally. He has a bit more space to work with than at flyhalf and Butch at 10 takes pressure off him and means he doesn't have to dictate play in the backline. I also think playing next to Butch and JdV will help him.
His passing is the biggest problem, I still think his future is at fullback, but I don't think he'll be a bad centre if he works on distribution.

 

[colonnello77]

what do you think about italy and mainly young italians Mclean, Garcia, Marcato?