One of the most interesting questions to ask Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus right now is who he will start with at flyhalf in the biggest match of the southern hemisphere international season against the All Blacks in Auckland in September.
Many would consider Handré Pollard to be his No 1 on the basis that he’s the man you’d back if there was a World Cup final, normally tight, low scoring games, to be played tomorrow. Having four years of boasting rights on the line brings the need for nerves of steel into play and Pollard has that in abundance.
But note that I was talking about a final to be played tomorrow. We have another two and a bit years to go until the next World Cup, and apart from the question marks about Pollard’s age, there is the one about his playing style.
He was a revelation when he first played for the Boks, and he stunned the All Blacks in the 2014 Rugby Championship game at Ellis Park for the way he took the ball to the line and troubled their defensive system. Unfortunately Pollard had that coached out of him the next year when a calamitous start to the 2015 World Cup, meaning the defeat to Japan in Brighton, forced him and the team into ultraconservative mode.
It nearly succeeded, with just two points separating the Boks from New Zealand in the semifinal, and had the South Africans got over the line the end would have justified the means. For whatever reason, Pollard doesn’t take the ball at the gain line any more, he takes it a little behind it, and the changes the new Bok attack coach Tony Brown spoke about making to Pollard’s game haven’t been noticeable.
Pollard doesn’t quite give you the same dynamic on attack as the other two flyhalves in the Bok squad, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu and Manie Libbok. And that was writ large by both in Cape Town, when an admittedly poor Barbarians team was put to the sword by a combination of Feinberg-Mngomezulu and Libbok in a wet weather game in which the flair of that pair was still evident despite the conditions — Feinberg-Mngomezulu in the first half and Libbok in the second.
The Bok attacking game looked much more predictable in the first Test against Italy at Loftus when Pollard was at pivot. The Boks did lead 28-3 at halftime in that game, but the Boks laboured in breaking the Italian defensive system down. The Boks dominated possession in the first half-hour and launched wave after wave of attack but struggled to get through.
That wasn’t the case in Gqeberha at the weekend, where from the lofty perch of the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium press box the effect Libbok had in bringing width to the game was obvious. Feinberg-Mngomezulu is capable of that and is a fine attacking flyhalf, and because he is a better all-rounder than Libbok, meaning he is also capable of controlling a game with the skill and length of his field kicking, the smart money should be on him being the starting No 10 if the Boks make the next World Cup final.
He has what Pollard has, and an outrageous attacking X-factor. However, at this stage of his career he might still be a bit too individualistic, which prevents a perfect connection with the players around him.
So Libbok may be the best Bok flyhalf right now, particularly after correcting his placekicking, and given that the Eden Park game against the Kiwis isn’t a RWC final and it may demand the Boks to score a lot of tries, he’d be my pick. A lot though will depend on what happens in the three games to be played between now and then, and let’s not forget that Erasmus chose Feinberg-Mngomezulu to front the All Blacks at Ellis Park last year when he was a year younger and less experienced, and it was a success.
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