VIDEO - Rassie lifts the lid on Bok red-card storm
DUBLIN, IRELAND: It was inevitable that red cards would dominate the conversation following the Springbok team announcement on Thursday, and this time, head coach Rassie Erasmus offered a full breakdown of the entire process from start to finish.
The saga around the red cards came about after two Springbok No.5 locks – Lood de Jager (vs France) and Franco Mostert (vs Italy) – were given their marching orders with permanent red cards two weekends in a row for high tackles (head contact).
In both cases, Erasmus was visibly frustrated and appeared baffled by how the refereeing team handled the incidents.
On Thursday, De Jager lost his appeal against the four-match ban for foul play in his side’s 32-17 win over France on November 8. Mostert got lucky as his red card was rescinded.
After the team announcement, Rugby365 asked the coach what the mindset was heading into this week, and especially if the two-metre-tall locks underwent special tackle training, as the lock stocks are now very depleted and the team can’t afford any more mishaps.
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“Most of the time, you know what you are going to get [in a game] if you level change and wrap,” the coach explained.
This term ‘level change and wrap’ was also used by Springbok lock Eben Etzebeth on Wednesday to explain what tall players must do when they go into a tackle.
“With Felix [Jones] being on the calibration group committees, I give you my word. I can give you the minutes on what we spend on level change and wrap, and the check zone.
“If you look at our actual record on low tackles and dominant tackles, you’ll find that with tall guys, we are doing pretty well with that.
“So, it’s the one or two accidents, and then it is foul play because somebody got hurt, and there might have been head contact or not head contact. So, it’s not that which is uncertain.
“Maybe, it’s just in the heat of the moment, the pressure, the crowd. The screen is 70 metres away from the referee, and he can’t see the finer details. So, I think sometimes it’s just okay, ‘that’s a clear red’, but maybe just calm down, send it to the bunker, check it out, and let it stay a red.
“But two permanent reds? We, as South Africans, don’t think we’re getting nailed. We’re trying to say, ‘listen, just understand and go and look at our record of all tackles. These two red cards are standing out; there’s a good record.
“We didn’t even give a penalty away with 14 men in the whole second half on defence in both games [against France and Italy]. So, we’re quite disciplined there. I don’t know if it’s an anomaly or whatever we say, to have two red cards like that.
“Definitely, we don’t feel like somebody is trying to nail us. We just want to make sure that people know, we work hell of a lot on level change, wrap, and check zone.”
“We’re confident in the protocols and the process that’s followed. I sat in and listened to most of those things, and I totally understand how they got to Lood and Franco’s result.
“Somewhere, a mistake was made, but if it can be rectified, fantastic, then we all believe in the system.”
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