Boks’ brutish style delivered with panache

FIVE minutes before the end of the Springboks’ record-breaking win over the All Blacks, I told my wife I wasn’t going to bother hanging up the washing.

- 

As an All Black supporter from Namibia, she thought I was being smug about the ongoing trouncing in Wellington. But, as André Esterhuizen bumped Beauden Barrett into the stands for the Boks’ sixth try of the match, I explained to her that if I did hang up the washing, we’d be going to work on Monday smelling of boerewors and chops marinated in Six Gun Spice.

Yep, as a veteran braaier myself, I knew the country’s finest kameeldoring would fill the air with smoke when scrumhalf Cobus Reinach kicked the ball into touch to put the All Blacks out of their misery.

A part of me, however, wanted the Boks to have one more go - to try and put up 50 against the New Zealanders. To do it for those Bok teams who lost 57-15 in Durban in 2016 and 57-0 in Albany in 2017. But that was probably unnecessary, like your spouse bringing out marshmallows on a stick to braai because the coals are still good.

The statement had been made. Not only had the Springboks dismantled the All Blacks on their own turf, but they had done so with a style of rugby that was brutish, yet unmistakably fresh, fearless and fluid.