Loose Pass

PdV: The man with the plan?

Welcome to Loose Pass - our weekly assortment of musings, mutterings, tickled fancies and disjointed thoughts. This week we will be mostly concerning ourselves with Peter de Villiers and faking it...

So, first blood to the Boks - and what a game it was!

South Africa coach Peter de Villiers has copped flak for just about everything he has ever done in rugby, but he deserves copious praise for those devastating first 60 minutes from the locals in the first Test.

Were the Boks 'underdone' as the Lions had dared to hope? Not at bit of it. In fact, their time out of the limelight and behind closed doors allowed them to perfect their execution of the fundamentals and to pinpoint the weaknesses of the touring party.

Tendai 'Beast' Mtawarira, with the shoulder of Victor Matfield up his backside, up against a proud but creaking old warhorse...

That now seems like such an obvious area to target, but no one even broach the idea prior to the big game. No one except De Villiers and his lieutenants, that is.

Result? Nine points from three scrummaging infringements in the first half alone. Thank you very much.

Strategically, the Boks got it just about right, too. The coach's selection of Ruan Pienaar at fly-half was roundly rubbished in South Africa but the youngster played with the assurance of an old pro.

How we all laughed when PdV compared him to Tiger Woods, but indeed there was something about Pienaar's steely self-confidence that had us expecting a portly American in a bad shirt to shout "get in the hole" each time the youngster shaped to kick.

PdV was also slated for withdrawing his charges from the Lions' provincial dates. Yes, the absence of the big guns damaged the quality of the pre-series games and kept the crowds away, but it also lured the Lions into a false sense of security, which the locals ruthlessly exploited in the first Test.

Had the tourist had a preview of the likes of Mtawarira, Bismarck du Plessis and Victor Matfield they probably would not have gone into the first Test with an inflated sense of their own ability up front. They would have probably swayed selection towards muscle over mobility.

That Heinrich Brussow, the only Bok the Lions had already met, was kept largely in check in Durban shows what benefits can be drawn from knowing thine enemy. The Lions simply didn't know what to make of the other 14 Boks on field, and when - after around an hour of play - they had finally worked it out, it was too late for the game ... most probably too late for the series.

Even the byproduct of PdV's policy of rest before Test - those sparsely attended provincial clashes - played into the Boks' hands on Saturday.

The first sighting of a chockablock South African stadium left the Lions looking positively overawed in those crucial few moments before kick-off. They were forced to stand there and suck it in as 40,000 flags fluttered and the Boks joined arms to belt out (parts of) South Africa's stirring anthem.

That dismal Lions ditty 'The Power of Four' had to go, but some sort of official function might have steadied fluttering Lion hearts during the one-sided preliminaries. For the ten minutes leading up to the biggest moment of their lives, the red-chested tourists held a rank somewhere between the assembled ballboys and the boerewors hawkers.

With all this in mind, one might feel inclined to doff one's cap to De Villiers: he out-foxed his opposite number, Ian McGeechan, hitherto the arch-fox of world rugby.

Yet inevitably, the Bok boss has been pilloried for removing his big guns in the last quarter of the game - a move that is said to have allowed the Lions back into the game.

Why did he do that? Let's have a flick through the South Africa newspapers to find out. It was either "arrogance", "naivety" or just plain, old "stupidity" - take your pick.

Then again, it could have been because most coaches look to the bench on the hour mark.

It could also have some to do with the fact that there are still two Tests to be played in this series.

Oh, and perhaps it was somehow related to the fact that the Boks were leading 26-7 with just 14 minutes left to play!

No one could have possibly foreseen the Lions' ferocious comeback in the dying moments of the game, but the South African rugby public will tell you that they did. They are hard taskmasters. Until De Villiers marries his many skills to clairvoyance, he'll remain unloved, unvalued and - most worryingly - unwelcome.

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On that note, De Villiers could do worse than to seek out the advice of John Smit - a man whose ability to see into the future came into eerie Nostradamus-esque focus on Saturday.

Having been subbed off, the last thing we expected to see was the Bok captain warming up furiously as the Lions clawed their way back from the brink.

"Bless! Good ol' Smitty is longing to get back out there to steady his troops and shepherd them across the line," we thought.

Unfortunately for him," we continued, "the laws of the game dictate that he can't return to the field unless there's an injury to one of the South African props and there's no one left on the bench to fill the gap expect good ol' Smitty himself."

You probably can't guess what happened next. As soon as good ol' Smitty's warm-up routine was complete, replacement prop Deon Carstens went down clutching his neck in agony. What are the chanced of that?

With no other fit front-rowers available, good ol' Smitty was duly able to return to the field, and he promptly steadied his troops and shepherded them across the line. Hurrah!

Not so fast. It would have been a happy ending had it not been for that terrible-looking injury suffered by Carstens. Oh, our mistake - he's absolutely fine.

On a serious note, the powers-that-be need to take a look at these sorts of shenanigans. The season has featured far too much play-acting.

Indeed, one Guinness Premiership club was even accused of splashing around theatrical blood in order to get their goal-kicker back on the pitch after the opposition threatened to pull a Houdini.

It has to stop - it runs contrary to the very ethos of our game.

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As sure as day follows night, a slow news weekend led to Danny Cipriani appearing in the tabloids. He was snapped leaving a 'show bar' in Colorado and is alleged to have got shirty with the photographer who was lying in wait.

But the pap's version of events smacks of someone making a great deal out of not much at all.

His photographs also tell a less than bellicose story: the England pivot was hardly pulling an Amy Winehouse.

And there's something distinctly fishy about that dismembered glove in his armpit. Has a cop being airbrushed out? And if so, why? Might he have been striking a pose that flew in the face of the story's tortured angle? Was he smiling, perhaps?

Any which way, we think we can forgive Cipriani for his latest foible. Surely it is impossible for a man on tour to pass a bar advertising 'The Best Breast in the West' without venturing in to investigate. After all, why only one? What happen to the twin? Is it a left or a right? So many questions...

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That said, perhaps a little less gallivanting and a little more training would have served the Saxons better in North America.

To say that they were systematically destroyed by their Irish counterparts in the final of the Churchill Cup is an understatement. They were taken apart bit by bit, with each puny little morsel of torn flesh stamped into the Denver dust by a marauding gang of Irishmen.

The game underlined the two countries' divergent rugby fortunes over the last few seasons. While the men in green played with huge heart and massive unity of purpose, the English looked like they were just going through the motions.

Far be it for us to(m) name names, but some of players in white looked totally uninterested. Worse, they didn't even seem to care that they were representing their country.

With the possible exception of the defiant Micky Young, if will be a huge surprise if any of these Saxons come within sight of the senior squad in the coming season.

Fetch Martin Johnson some desks to smash. He's going to need quite a few.

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Reasons why RWC 2011 should have gone to Japan instead of New Zealand - number 1,298: France centre Mathieu Bastareaud returns home with "severe facial injuries" after being recognised and set upon by a group of men in a Wellington street.

Okay, we know this isn't indicative of New Zealand in general, but it doesn't look good. Drag these morons from the hole in which they are hiding and throw the book at them.

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OPEN-EYED QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

"Well, you know, the Lions have great backs."
- Ruan Pienaar passes judgements on the tourists' pack.

ONE-EYED QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

"That was a thoroughly deserved victory for the All Blacks."
- Murray Mexted gives his verdict after New Zealand scrape a 14-10 win over France in Wellington, but lose hold of the Dave Gallaher Cup.

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Well, our amazing Rugby Date Prediction System (RDPS) bore fruit last week - 'South Africa to pip the Lions' was its call - so we thought we'd give it another run.

So, mortgages at the ready, here we go! Which side does June 27 favour?

Year: 1759
Event: General James Wolfe begins the siege of Quebec.
Omens: Troops in red score a near-impossible victory on foreign fields?
Verdict: Onwards to Johannesburg! LIONS

Year: 1967
Event: The world's first ATM is installed in Enfield, London.
Omens: HSBC 1, Sasol 0
Verdict: The next round is on the... LIONS

Year: 1986
Event: Route 66 ceases to be an official US highway.
Omens: End of the road for the travellers?
Verdict: This bus terminates in Pretoria. BOKS

Year: 2007
Event: Tony Blair resigns as Prime Minister of the UK and succeeded by Gordon Brown.
Omens: Things go from bad to worse for the British?
Verdict: A landslide defeat beckons for the red party. BOKS

So there it is - there's nothing in it! A draw is the call. And just to underline this parity, just look who will be celebrating his 29th birthday on Saturday: Kevin Pietersen! Spooky.

Got something to add?

Compiled by Andy Jackson