South African rugby critics were made to eat their words when the Springboks returned from their tour to Europe with five consecutive victories and a remarkable 86% win record for the 2025 Test season.
It’s been a monumental year for the team, after the successful defence of the Freedom Cup and Rugby Championship titles for the first time.
More recently, they beat Japan 61-7 in London, France 32-17 in Paris, Italy 32-14 in Turin, Ireland 24-13 in Dublin and Wales 73-0 in Cardiff.
While results are important at the highest level, these margins tell the story of the Boks’ dominance and why they are the undisputed kings of international rugby.
The emphatic wins in Paris and Dublin should be enough to eradicate any doubts about the pecking order. The official World Rugby rankings also make the point, with the Boks at the top of the ladder.
Until now, many critics abroad have been reluctant to give the Boks their due.
Back in 2023, the French rugby fraternity was up in arms after the Boks edged France in an ill-tempered World Cup quarterfinal in Paris. Afterwards, French captain Antoine Dupont suggested that referee Ben O’Keeffe had cost his team the game.
The theme was revisited in the build-up to the fixture on November 8. Scrumhalf Maxime Lucu accused the Boks of “stealing France’s World Cup” — South Africa went on to win the 2023 title — and said the players and coaches were desperate for revenge.
But on the night, it was the Boks who made the biggest statement. France won the Six Nations this year. Few teams beat France in Paris and even fewer score four tries and 32 points against the renowned French defence, let alone one with a player advantage after a Springbok red card.
The next fixture against Italy in Turin proved something of a banana peel, after Bok coach Rassie Erasmus rotated his squad and saved some first-choice players for the subsequent showdown against Ireland on November 22.
Franco Mostert was given a controversial red card in the 11th minute — one that was later rescinded — and the Boks played most of the match with 14 men. Despite that setback, they scored four tries and won by 18 points.
The biggest statement of the tour was delivered in Dublin.
Ireland have been the Boks’ bogey side in recent times, claiming four wins in the northern hemisphere and securing a famous 1-1 series draw in South Africa last season.
Coached by Andy Farrell, Ireland featured many players who starred for the British & Irish Lions on their successful tour to Australia in July. They were expected to put the Boks in their place and extend South Africa’s long drought in Dublin.
But in the wake of the 24-13 Bok victory, many critics felt that the South Africans should have won by more than 11 points, such was their physical dominance on the day.
The Boks savaged the Irish scrum, forcing eight penalties, two of which led to yellow cards, and one of which led to a penalty try. While the Boks didn’t take all their chances, they did score four tries — another first for South Africa against Ireland in the Erasmus-coached era.
The big wins against Japan and Wales were expected, given that both teams rank outside of World Rugby’s top 10 and don’t have the resources to cope with the Boks’ blend of power and panache.
Nevertheless, the Boks went out of their way to make a broader statement over the course of the tour — one that will echo through to the 2027 World Cup. They are the best team on the planet and well ahead of the chasing pack.
The evidence suggests that they have lost none of the set-piece power or kick-chase accuracy that characterised their successful World Cup victories in 1995, 2007, 2019 and 2023.
But over the past two years, Erasmus has looked to develop the team’s attack and to integrate players with broader skill sets, all with the aim of amplifying the Boks’ overall threat.
The Boks’ recent dominance has prompted another question: are they peaking too soon?
The results speak for themselves. The Boks have won 22 out of 26 Tests since the start of the 2024 season, winning back-to-back Rugby Championship titles and claiming a few important one-off victories along the way.
This season, they put six tries past the All Blacks in a record-breaking 43-10 win in Wellington, before routing Argentina 67-30 in Durban a few weeks later.
They went on to tick a couple of big boxes in Paris and Dublin and finished the season with their best win percentage (86%) in a non-World Cup year (professional era).
Since former All Blacks flyhalf Tony Brown joined the coaching staff, the Boks have looked to play with more width and tempo while harnessing their set-piece and kicking strengths. They scored 572 points and 81 tries over the course of 14 Tests in 2025, breaking their own records for the Erasmus era.
Somehow Erasmus has managed to maintain the team’s quest for results while expanding the game plan — and has introduced a new generation of players who will add balance to the group at the 2027 World Cup.
Flyhalf Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, utility backs Ethan Hooker and Canan Moodie and versatile front-rower Jan-Hendrik Wessels are younger than 25 and have been backed more consistently in recent months.
Feinberg-Mngomezulu had a season to remember, topping the try-scoring (nine) and point-scoring (120) charts for the Boks, while Hooker, Moodie and Wessels made key contributions in big matches.
Eight players made their Test debuts in the 2025 season, with props Boan Venter and Zachary Porthen among the newcomers who made a significant impact on the tour to Europe.
Given that several members of the Junior Bok team that won the World Rugby under-20 championship were recently invited to train with the senior side, it shouldn’t be long before we see Bathobele Hlekani, Cheswill Jooste, Haashim Pead and other rising stars competing at the highest level.
Not that Erasmus will make wholesale cuts to his existing squad in the lead-up to the 2026 Test season and the 2027 World Cup.
Ox Nché and Pieter-Steph du Toit were nominated for the World Rugby Player of the Year accolade recently, while Malcolm Marx won the award.
Siya Kolisi, Damian de Allende and Eben Etzebeth (the eye-gouge incident that led to a red card in Cardiff aside) are among a group of older players who continue to excel at the highest level. The 35-year-old Cobus Reinach is playing the best rugby of his career and is the perfect foil for the 23-year-old Feinberg-Mngomezulu in South Africa’s first-choice halfback pairing.
Props Thomas du Toit and Wilco Louw have thrived in the absence of injured veterans Frans Malherbe, Trevor Nyakane and Vincent Koch, while André Esterhuizen has reinvented himself as a “hybrid player” who adds value at flank or centre late in a match. Ruan Nortjé, Jasper Wiese, Manie Libbok, Aphelele Fassi, Damian Willemse and several others in their late 20s will be in their prime by the time the Boks touch down for the World Cup in Australia in two years.
The Boks’ recent dominance has prompted another question: are they peaking too soon?
It’s a fair question that’s been asked of other teams in the lead-up to major tournaments. As history shows, the All Blacks failed to fulfil their promise at the 2019 World Cup in Japan, while pre-tournament favourites France and Ireland bowed out in the quarterfinals in 2023.
Erasmus’s rotation policy, however, suggests that the Boks are still searching for answers in certain positions and looking to bolster the depth before the next global tournament.
The Boks shouldn’t need motivation in the lead-up to the 2026 season, which will begin with a battle against England in the new Nations Championship competition.
England won 11 matches in a row this year and have borrowed a few pages from Erasmus’s playbook. If they crack on to win the 2026 Six Nations, they will believe they can beat the Boks when the teams meet on July 4 in South Africa.
Beyond the matches against England, Scotland and Wales next July, the Boks will focus on a revived four-Test series against New Zealand, which will be played every four years, the first taking place in South Africa in 2026. While the Boks have won five of their last six matches against the All Blacks, they will be keen to make a statement in a series that has the potential to be as big and significant as a Lions tour.
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