Scotland v SA: Is the Bok defence up for this?

STAT ATTACK: The upcoming clash between the World Champion Springboks and their 2023 World Cup opening clash opponents Scotland has all the ingredients to be a try fest when the two sides meet this Sunday at Murrayfield.

Defence wins championships, and that is hard to argue against when one look at history, but the game has evolved into a more ball-in-hand approach to unlock defensive systems that are so similar in the Test arena, yet some teams are more effective and accurate in excecuting it than others.

South Africa, uncharacteristically didn’t have the best defence during the Rugby Championship, at least statistically where they were last in terms of tackles won with an 83.9 percent success rate.

Their attack, however has been a different story.

South Africa topped the Rugby Championship charts with the most tries scored (24), most metres gained (3053), second in defenders beaten (139) and third in offloads (26).

The world saw the ‘boring Boks’ of 2019 who based their gameplan on the simplicity of a solid set-piece and watertight defensive system which saw them clinch the 2019 World Cup and 2021 British and Irish Lions series evolve into one of the best attacking Test sides currently in the game.

In the past the Springboks were labelled as ‘boring’ and were even accused of ‘killing the game’ by various coaches, former players and pundits.

Despite some growing pains in 2022, the Boks slowly began to change that narrative and the introduction of players such as Kurt-Lee Arendse, Grant Williams and Manie Libbok paid dividends in 2023 – when they surprised friend and foe with their attacking flair during the shortened Rugby Championship and particularly the World Cup.

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Scotland, however are another dangerous beast and will want to change their poor record against the Springboks who they haven’t beaten since taking down Peter de Villiers’ side back in 2010.

Scotland boasts 19 Glasgow Warriors players in their squad, of which two are uncapped and it’s no surprise that there’s direct similarities to Scotland’s clash against Fiji and Glasgow’s season stats.

Glasgow are currently first in the 2024/5 URC season in terms of points scored (198), tries scored (30), metres gained (2517), clean breaks (63) and defenders beaten (166) while they are fourth in the offloading department (54).

Scotland similarly against Fiji had beaten 41 defenders and made 10 offloads and 12 linebreaks to gain 632 metres.

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They have shown that they are a really good attacking Test outfit who can cause defences to scramble and break if they’re not at the top of their game.

This will be the biggest challenge for the Boks this coming Sunday while still being able to keep on their ever evolving attacking game and finding the perfect balance between the two contrasting elements.