Balance key when Boks tackle England

South Africa’s new scrum guru, former French prop Pieter de Villiers, has spoken of the need for the right balance between experience and youthful exuberance when the Springboks tackle England in June.

The South African-born French international, who played in two World Cups for his adopted country, told this website in an exclusive interview that it is very important to have experienced players that will help grow younger players.

De Villiers, who will act as a ‘scrum consultant’ with Heyneke Meyer’s Springboks, was heartened by the many young props making their mark in Super Rugby this season – the likes of Steven Kitshoff, Frans Malherbe, Coenie Oosthuizen, Pat Cilliers and Caylib Oosthuizen.

Add to that established props like Gurthrö Steenkamp (albeit playing abroad), Jannie du Plessis, CJ van der Linde (out injured), Tendai Mtawarira (coming back from injury), Dean Greyling and Werner Kruger and it is a rosy picture indeed.

But it is the quality of the young front row forwards that is causing the biggest stir.

De Villiers said the key would be to ensure there is enough experience in the pack to guide any youngsters through the early stages of their international careers.

“South Africa has always been blessed with a deep reservoir of quality players,” De Villiers told this website, when asked about the rash of props at the disposal of new Bok coach Heyneke Meyer.

“At the moment we are seeing a lot of quality props coming through at a young age, which is fantastic to see.”

He pointed out that in the past it was difficult for prop to come through at the age of 20.

“Now, in the professional era, where the training intensity has taken a step up and they start this training intensity at a younger age, we actually have props that become ‘ripe’ for top level rugby at a younger age,” the Boks’ new scrum guru said.

“Often in the past props had to wait so much longer before they were mature enough for top level rugby.

“That was partly because of scrummaging being such a fine art to get under the belt that it took more time.

“The training intensity now gets prop ready for top level rugby at a younger age, which is great to see.

“We have guys like [Steven] Kitshoff and [Coenie] Oosthuizen… there are many props coming through at the moment.”

He admitted that in the days before the professional era often props were manual labourers, which helped them build up natural strength. Now the players, with specialist gym work, have the opportunity to build from a young age.

De Villiers admitted it is because of the way the game has changed.

“You need to counter that with ‘hard labour’ in a different way,” he said of the days of manual labourers, “that’s why I’m saying training has intensified and training has become very position specific as well.

“I for example spends a lot of time withy props doing scrum specific stuff and I can keep them busy for some time.

“Those kind of things help props ‘mature’ a bit earlier. A way has been found to ensure our props can still get to scrummaging maturity at a young age – that is through hard work and position specific training methods.”

However, he cautioned against relying too much on youthful exuberance and said there is a need for balance and keeping an eye on the “bigger picture”.

“It depends how much experience you have in the rest of your pack,” he said, when asked about the clamour for youngsters like Kitshoff, as well as well as the Oosthuizens, to start ahead of veteran like Mtawarira and Du Plessis.

De Villiers was at pains to stress that he was not playing selector, but merely painting a general picture.

“I’m talking rugby in general – the more experience you have in your pack, the more you can give youngsters opportunity… be that at prop, lock or No.8.

“It is all a matter of balancing that experience out and then say I have a pack that is a dominator and I can put more youngsters in because they are mature. It is obviously important to have an experienced prop in your set-up – be that province, club, school or the Boks.

“It is very important to have experienced players that will help grow younger players and will assist them in technical issues.

“Also [it helps] to provide good scrummaging opponents when you get to live scrums. To become a good scrummaging prop does take time, it requires scrummaging against experienced props to pick up different bits and pieces of technique.”

He described scrumming as “very complex”, because every scrummager you will be working against will have different techniques and different ways.

“Every Saturday and every scrum basically is a learning curve, which makes experience worth its weight in gold.

“Having experience in a pack will immediately give confidence to a younger player as well.

“They will be able to guide the younger player, play a leadership role and make him feel at ease if that first day doesn’t go well at the office… those older players will put the youngster at ease.”

De Villiers, who has not been appointed formally yet, is still in negotiation with the South African Rugby Union about his future role – both with the Boks and SARU.

“We are still discussing exactly what I will do… around the whole position. For the moment I am a scrum consultant.

“I also spoke to Heyneke [Meyer] and he wants me involved with the Boks on a scrummaging side, but there is also a need and a value in working with props at a young age… working on their techniques, positions and core strength – combining that technique and core strength with strength endurance to work on a very specific energy needs of a prop.

“Those would be the scrum bits, the defence bits and all the rest… which come in with other coaches as well. All of that, I am still busy speaking with SARU to see where I would fit in in the bigger picture.”

The Malmesbury-born De Villiers, now 39, made the brave decision to head to France in 1994, joining Stade Français. He made his debut for France in 1999, just prior to the start of the World Cup in Wales. Despite only having the one international cap, De Villiers was included in France’s World Cup squad. He came on as a replacement in the quarterfinal win over Argentina. He also played in the subsequent famous semifinal victory over the All Blacks. France made it through to the final, where they met the Wallabies. Australia won 35-12.

He went on to play for France in 68 Tests, but in December 2007 he suffered a neck injury that sidelined him for a large part of the 2007-08 season. Even after recovering, he had difficulty breaking back into the Stade Français squad. On April 18, 2008, he announced his retirement from playing the game and took up coaching. He is currently involved with the Villager’s club in Cape Town.

At club level he had a very successful career, winning the French championships in 1998, 2000, 2003, 2004 and 2007.

By Jan de Koning