Northern lights can dazzle Boks

THE CLASH of the Northern Hemisphere grand slam winners and the Tri-Nations and world champions at Croke Park this afternoon assumes even greater significance now that both sides are able to field as close to full-strength as makes no difference.

True, Ireland are without Luke Fitzgerald and Marcus Horan and there are also one or two notable absentees from the South African line-up, most notably number eight Juan Smith and full-back Francois Steyn. But in a contact sport like rugby, it is a rarity when any side can muster a full deck and so it’s all to play for in another of the fascinating kind of confrontations that have lit up the Irish sporting firmament in recent years.

All week, we have been assured by both camps that there is “no animosity” between the teams. We will take their words at face value except with the caveat that we also know for sure that there is no love lost between them. The Springboks are still smarting at losing their two most recent games on Irish soil and naturally enough the home side would like nothing more than to make it a hat-trick of wins.

Suddenly, too, all the talk about the Boks being tired and almost disinterested at the end of a long and highly successful campaign has evaporated. Mind games always have their place on these occasions but they mean less and less the nearer it comes to kick-off. Springbok coach Peter de Villiers more or less acknowledged that yesterday when comparing the wealth of talent he now has at his disposal in contrast to the parlous situation he found himself in at the beginning of the tour.

“We couldn’t make any choices three weeks back but now we can pick and choose and play around with players,” he enthused.

For his part, captain John Smit rubbished the notion that fatigue might impair their performance, declaring that “we won’t use that as an excuse. It really isn’t the end of a season, just a different part of the year.”

Several Irish players expressed the view during the week that this was the game the Springboks would target more than any other on the tour. That has been borne out when de Villiers chose his strongest possible side. The magnificent Victor Matfield is restored to the second-row to team up with Bakkies Botha while Smit reverts to his original position of hooker (where he gained the first 77 of his 92 caps) to make way for the inclusion at tight head of Ulster’s BJ Botha. They also have the redoubtable Bismarck du Plessis, arguably the finest hooker in the world right now, available once again after injury and he is virtually certain to be called into the fray early in the second half.

Either way, though, Ireland know only too well the kind of challenge awaiting them in the set pieces. It’s a big ask for new boy Cian Healy, Jerry Flannery and John Hayes to take on the likes of Botha, Smit and The Beast himself, Tendai Mtawarira, and their success or otherwise in measuring up could play a vital role in the eventual outcome.

Hayes will take a considerable degree of comfort and confidence from the outstanding manner in which he coped with The Beast in the third Lions Test last June while Botha’s game is well-known in his country due to his alliance with Ulster.

The Springboks have also found themselves in the happy position of being able to plug what remaining gaps exist in their first choice line-up with people of the calibre of Schalk Burger in the back-row and Wynand Oliver in the centre.

The strength in depth of South African rugby is best exemplified by the presence in the replacement panel of Munster’s Jean de Villiers, Ruan Pienaar, Leinster’s CJ Van der Linde and, of course, Bismarck du Plessis.

There is no point in suggesting otherwise: it would be some achievement for Ireland to lower their colours. And yet there are several salient reasons to suggest that they can do so.

Much, of course, will centre on how new out-half Jonny Sexton settles down at out-half. He has shown in recent big games with Leinster and on his international debut against Fiji last week that he has the facility to lift his game on the big occasion, this is a level of challenge with which he is totally unfamiliar.

The Boks know that and will target Ireland’s 10-12 channel ruthlessly, intent on discovering whether Sexton and the sometimes frail-looking Paddy Wallace possess the stuff to survive and prosper – especially defensively.

Sexton knows that the others around him will provide what support they can with David Wallace happy to ride shotgun as he has so often done in the past for Ronan O’Gara although he will have his own hands full dealing with the live Springbok number seven Heinrich Brussow. Skipper Brian O’Driscoll will be a powerful steadying influence in midfield although at the end of the day, it’s how the forward duel pans out that will decide the outcome.

You fear a little for the scrummaging unit and suspect that Paul O’Connell, Donncha O’Callaghan and Jamie Heaslip will have their work cut out to exert their now customary supremacy at the line-out with Matfield and Bakkies Botha regarded as two of the greatest practitioners of the art in the game. David Wallace and Brussow will go at it hammer and tongs in the loose and the physicality of the battle at the breakdown involving the likes of Brussow, Burger, Heaslip and Stephen Ferris will be earth-shattering. South Africa are entitled to go into the game as favourites.

They may well justify that tag but this is the ideal opportunity for Ireland to strike a blow for the game in this part of the globe.

The fascinating question to be answered today is – are they good enough to do so? I suspect the answer is yes.