Ireland wary of wounded Bok theory

IRELAND are refusing to buy into the theory that tomorrow’s Test opponents South Africa are out of form and in the depths of despair.

The world champions arrived in Ireland yesterday for the inaugural international rugby match at the Aviva Stadium with star second row Bakkies Botha telling his Twitter followers: “Newspapers in Dublin not giving us a chance. I say bring it on!”

That was just the sort of incentive that the Irish management feared would spark a side with just one win in its last six Tri-Nations outings over the summer.

“We have to make sure that people don’t build them up that they’re dead and buried. That’s our challenge,” Ireland’s defence coach Les Kiss said yesterday.

“There’s a perception out there that there’s a few worries in their camp but they’ve played 10 Tests to date this year, the same as the Aussies and they both have a 50% success rate.

“They’ve scored more points than the Aussies and let the same amount of points in, so they’re not that far off.

“If we take them off lightly, they are written up in certain ways and a certain perception is put out there, we’ll come a cropper.”

Australian-born Kiss, a former defence coach with the Springboks, was a little off with his statistics, perhaps omitting the Wallabies’ weekend win over New Zealand from his analysis, while the South Africans’ victory count and points total includes back-to-back home wins over Italy. Yet the thrust of his argument was valid.

“You have to be prepared,” Kiss continued. “They’ll come here to play, and when you throw young guys into the mix, that’s a dangerous thing to come up against because anything can happen.

“They have good coaches, (head coach Peter) De Villiers with (Dick) Muir and (Gary) Gold, they’ll be primed for this. I know there are a lot of stories going around saying they are not ready for it, but we have to be ready for this one.”

Ireland forwards coach Gert Smal, a former assistant to previous Springboks coach Jake White, also pointed to the country of his birth’s poor recent record in Dublin, with no win since 2000, as a further motivation for the visitors.

“I think that is most probably part of the urgency to make it a big game. I don’t have any doubts in my mind that they’re going to go full out to try and beat us here. Especially with Victor (Matfield) as captain, it would be a great feather in his cap if they can do that.

“They’re obviously coming from not a good Tri-Nations and there will be a new team that’s a lot different. There’s a lot of youth but it’s going to be a good Bok side. You don’t get a weak Bok side.”

Ireland received some welcome news on the injury front with confirmation last night that Munster centre Keith Earls had overcome an ankle injury and would be fit to take his place on the replacements’ bench, while there was also news of the continuing progress of captain and fellow outside centre Brian O’Driscoll from a hamstring strain.

“He’s been the consummate pro as usual,” Kiss said. “He’s looking in good form, the medical staff have done a really good job with him and he’s actually got on the field a bit earlier than we thought he would. On the Monday session he came through great guns and did a good session on the Tuesday as well and did contact as well.”

How many people will be at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday is still not clear. The IRFU was last night still waiting to hear back from the clubs the exact number of ticket packages sold by them. Of the 4,000 packages already returned to the union, combining one ticket apiece for the South Africa and Samoa games and made available for general sale on the IRFU website, 2,500 are still available and would remain on sale on the website and right up until kick-off at the IRFU offices on Lansdowne Road.