Rassie Erasmus’ ‘honest’ take on Nations Championship: ‘We don’t see this as a competition’
Springboks winger Cheslin Kolbe in action against England and an inset of Rassie Erasmus.
Rassie Erasmus says that the Springboks won’t be changing their approach to Test matches in the inaugural Nations Championship.
The South Africans will be fully focused on winning the games and won’t be bothered by bonus points, even if it means that they don’t top their side of the table.
The biennial international rugby tournament debuts this year with the 12 teams split into two conferences: the Northern Hemisphere (Six Nations) and the Southern Hemisphere (SANZAAR nations plus Fiji and Japan).
Over two windows, teams play six matches against opposing conference teams, culminating in a Finals Weekend where nations face their equivalent-ranked counterpart.
Playing the Springbok way is more important
Try and losing bonus points are bound to come into play in the final rankings as well as the points for and against. However, Erasmus says that fact won’t influence the way the Springboks approach the encounters against England, Scotland and Wales this July.
“We’ve never played a competition with the Springboks apart from maybe the World Cup, where you get log points for Test match rugby,” he explained.
“It’s almost just been world rankings and, to be honest with you, we just want to try and win every match and obviously build squad depth, character and a playing style that everybody’s used to. So that when we get to the World Cup, there are a lot of players that can play the style we want to play, do things how we do it in Springbok rugby.
“I don’t think we really see this as a competition. We see this as the next Test match and the next Test match.”
Rassie Erasmus’ honest admission
It’s an honest admission from the Springboks head coach, who also revealed that the current squad selected is to just prepare for the clash against England and could change for the latter two matches against Scotland and Wales.
“If you only go full out to try and win this, in all honesty, probably not the thing that most people want to hear, but we want to beat England, Scotland and Wales, and I think they want to do the same with us. Going for bonus points and those things. I don’t know if that’s really Test match rugby,” he continued.
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“So no, we just want to win every single Test match. If it’s with one point and we played the rugby we want to try to play, which makes our fans and ourselves proud. So we don’t see it as log points and those things – we have never done that, and I don’t think we’ll change to that.”
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Erasmus’ focus is clearly on preparing the squad for the upcoming Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry with the All Blacks touring South Africa, as well as preparing the squad for the World Cup three-peat bid in Australia next year.
He further explained that, unlike a World Cup, he is able to rotate players in and out of the squad from week to week.
“It’s not like a World Cup when you announce a squad that you can only pick players from that squad. So next week Sunday after our first game, we might send a few guys back to rest and draft a few others in,” he said.
He added: “This squad is not the only guys that we will use for the first three Test matches, and after that there are some massive matches and the squad will definitely rotate.”
