These are unprecedented times of success for the Springboks.
Past coaches have battled for consistent results in the year after a World Cup title win and have failed to strike the necessary balance between winning big matches and developing the next generation of stars.
But in 2024, Rassie Erasmus ticked both boxes, steering the side to 11 victories in 13 matches (for a win record of 85%) while using 50 players over the course of the season.
The Boks made a statement earlier this year when they beat the All Blacks twice to claim the Freedom Cup for the first time since 2009. They went on to finish the Rugby Championship with a record of five wins in six matches.
This month Erasmus’s Boks completed a clean sweep of Scotland, England and Wales, becoming the first South African side since 2013 to win all of its northern hemisphere tour fixtures.
Erasmus fielded a largely second-string side against Scotland in Edinburgh, and the Boks still scored four tries in an emphatic 32-15 victory. Six days later, he unleashed his first-choice stars on England, and South Africa powered their way to a 29-20 win.
There was no sign of complacency in the final fixture of the season, and no quarter given against a weak Wales side that, in recent years, has had more than its fair share of problems, on and off the field. The Boks scored seven tries in a 45-12 victory in Cardiff on Saturday. It says much for South Africa’s new standards, as well as the media and fans’ heightened expectations, that the win was described in some quarters as unsatisfying.
It’s tempting to declare that Springbok rugby has never been stronger, and that this Bok side has reached its peak.
Last year, the Boks became the second team in history to win back-to-back World Cup titles (matching the All Blacks of 2011 and 2015), as well as the first to lift the Webb Ellis Cup four times.
Since then they have finished at the top of the World Rugby rankings for the second consecutive season.
Pieter-Steph du Toit, Eben Etzebeth and Cheslin Kolbe were recently acknowledged with World Rugby player of the year nominations, while rookie flyhalf Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu was included in the breakthrough of the year category. At the ceremony in Monaco on Sunday, flanker Du Toit won the main prize — for the second time in his career — while he, Etzebeth, Kolbe, Damian de Allende, Jesse Kriel, Malcolm Marx and Ox Nché were named in World Rugby’s dream team for 2024.
Given all this group has achieved over the past six or seven years, it’s hardly an exaggeration to mark this Bok team as the best of all time. And yet, when you consider how the Boks won their matches in 2024, and how Erasmus juggled his resources with the future in mind, it’s fair to expect even more from the side in 2025 and beyond.
Making a statement
Back in February, when he held his first press conference of the year, Erasmus ruffled a few feathers by saying that development was more important than results at the beginning of the four-year World Cup cycle. The Bok coach dismissed the drive for an 80% win record if it meant compromising the quest to develop a larger squad, layered with veterans and youngsters with the potential to win a third consecutive World Cup title in 2027.
At the same press conference, Erasmus confirmed that two foreigners had been added to the Bok coaching staff. Again, there was some opposition to the appointment of attack coach Tony Brown, a former All Blacks flyhalf, and defence coach Jerry Flannery, a former Ireland hooker. But Erasmus was adamant that the forward-thinking duo would take a decorated team to even greater heights.
Few could have predicted how the season would pan out. While the win record of 85% is in itself a statement, as is a trophy cabinet stacked with silverware, a lot can be read into how the Boks have evolved in terms of their game plan and player management strategies.
What’s changed is the tempo of the attack and the players’ ability to strike decisively, even from deep within their own half
From the outset, Erasmus and Brown based the new attacking game plan on South Africa’s existing strengths at the set pieces and gain line. Having had some success coaching Japan — a team stacked with lightning-quick players who lack the Boks’ inherent size — Brown wondered what a bigger, more physical team might achieve if the players were encouraged to play with more tempo and width.
The numbers make a compelling argument for the Boks’ progress in this area. They enhanced their reputation as the best scrummaging unit in world rugby, forcing penalties against most teams throughout the season. They have continued to kick from hand, often more than their opponents, and have continued to view the aerial contest as one of the most important in the game.
What’s changed is the tempo of the attack and the players’ ability to strike decisively, even from deep within their own half.
Grant Williams, Handré Pollard and other Bok halfbacks have made the point that Brown has pushed the decision-makers to look for space in every situation. That new mindset has already led to some remarkable scores — such as Williams’s try against England at Twickenham, where he broke from the base of a ruck and then sidestepped the cover defence to finish.
Earlier this season, the Boks didn’t just win the Rugby Championship as much as dominate it. They may lament Manie Libbok’s late miss in the first Test against Argentina in Santiago del Estero, which cost them a clean sweep of their southern hemisphere opponents, but they finished the tournament at the top of the table. They also led the attacking stats for points and tries scored, as well as metres gained and line breaks.
Flannery has been just as influential for the Boks on the other side of the ball. A self-confessed disciple of former Bok coach Jacques Nienaber — the pair worked together at Irish club Munster in 2016 and 2017 — Flannery has tweaked rather than changed the Boks’ defensive structures, and this has complemented the team’s attacking ambitions.
An eye on the future
Erasmus will be thrilled that the Boks conceded only 10 tries in the six-game Rugby Championship — fewer than any other team — and a total of four on the recent three-match UK tour. The Boks may be getting a lot of plaudits for their attack, but their defence remains one of their biggest strengths.
Erasmus is building a new squad and game plan with a view to the 2027 World Cup
Conventional wisdom would suggest that the more settled teams are suited to such drastic changes in approach — and that the less experienced or much-changed combinations should take longer to adapt. But the Boks have exceeded expectations on this front, changing their game plan while rotating their team on a near weekly basis.
Erasmus is building a new squad and game plan with a view to the 2027 World Cup. Other coaches may have implemented the new playing structures while favouring more experienced combinations. The Bok coach, however, has decided to change the game plan while experimenting with new and younger combinations.
As many as 12 players made their Test debuts in the 2024 season, with Bulls loose forward Cameron Hanekom the latest rookie to get his chance (against Wales in Cardiff). Other players who were on the fringe before this season — loosehead prop Gerhard Steenekamp, loose forward Elrigh Louw and fullback Aphelele Fassi — have been given more opportunities in recent months and have proved that they belong.
What’s more, Erasmus has often selected these younger players alongside more seasoned stars to maintain some balance and improve the chances of success.
Some suggested that the coach took a gamble by selecting Jordan Hendrikse to start at flyhalf against Wales on Saturday, in only his second Test. But more should be read into the 22-year-old being picked alongside De Allende and Kriel, the most experienced midfield combination South Africa has yet seen.
Erasmus selected other less experienced players in the starting side, among them Bulls forwards Johan Grobbelaar and Louw, while loading his bench with veterans. Not for the first time in his tenure, he has asked a promising yet less established starting XV to take the fight to the opposition in the first half, and a grizzled “bomb squad” to finish the job in the second.
All things considered, the Bok coach could not have asked for a better outcome, in terms of short-term results as well as development with the future in mind.
South Africa may be at the top of the rankings, but they could reach new heights in the coming years.
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