VIDEO: Champions galore, but serious challenges remain
South Africa’s Under-20 team arrived home on Monday, having joined the Springboks and Sevens team as World Champions.
Several members of Riley Norton’s team, who ended a 13-year wait to claim the global Under-20 crown with a 23-15 victory over New Zealand this past weekend, are earmarked for higher honours.
However, retaining the services of players coming through on a well-oiled conveyor belt, is going to prove more challenging than most pundits would admit.
SA Rugby Chief Executive Officer Rian Oberholzer waxed lyrical about the achievement of Norton and his team, while also commending coach Kevin Foote and his backroom staff.
“From being seventh in the world [on the Under-20 rankings] last year to become [2025] champions, in such a short time, is an exceptional effort by the team management and the players,” Oberholzer told @rugby365com.
“It shows the talent we have in South Africa.
“If we use it wisely, the results will come.”
The SA Rugby boss explained that a ‘system overhaul’ has contributed to the overall performances of all national teams, with the Under-20, Sevens and Springboks all World Champions.
Even the national women’s team has improved to a stage where they have realistic expectations of qualifying for the knock-out stages of the World Cup, starting in England next month.
(WATCH as SA Rugby Chief Executive Officer Rian Oberholzer chats to @king365ed about the system that creates world champions from age-group level to the Springboks…..)
While the distinguished and commemorated double World Cup winner Rassie Erasmus is in charge of the Springboks, David Wessels is the General Manager of High Performance at SA Rugby, ensuring other national teams like the women, Under-20, Under-18, and Sevens are also successful.
“We have a team that focuses solely on the next tier of talent coming through, while Rassie and his team can focus on the Springboks” Oberholzer said.
“It is working well and there is good collaboration between them all,” he said of the juniors and other teams tapping into the IP available within Erasmus’ coaching roster, including Daan Human’s famous scrum farm in the Free State.
“The system is working and we are very happy.”
However, the rider is that keeping all the talent coming through the system in South Africa is the biggest challenge.
“It is not possible to keep everybody in South Africa,” Oberholzer told @rugby365com, when asked about the financial quandaries faced by the Republic.
“We have 800,000 registered players in South Africa.
“South Africa has, arguably, the biggest base of schoolboy players in the world.
“It is not possible to keep them all.
“Our challenge is to identify the best, who we believe can contribute to the Springbok team [one day] and attempt to keep them in the system.
“The next challenge we have is to ensure they get enough game time, work hard on the Currie Cup and make that a top competition again so that the boys want to play in that.
“Those are the challenges we are working on.”
Along with the restructuring, the recruitment of coaches like Johan Ackermann and Kevin Foote contributed greatly the overall success of the various national teams.
The system is also structured to ensure the teams – from Under-18 to the senior Boks – all play a traditional South African game.
“You can’t have a coach coaching a certain way at Under-18 and then at Under-20 the coach has different ideas.
“Then, when they arrive at the Springbok set-up, there is something different.
“David [Wessels] and the team worked hard with Rassie [Erasmus] and his staff.
“You see that the Under-20 team play like the Springboks play.
“That has been lacking for a while. It has been put in place and is working.
“The guys [junior coaches] admit they require assistance and will ask Rassie and his team to help with the scrums, rucks and mauls.”
@king365ed
@rugby365com
