Brive sign Springboks prop Van der Merwe

As I've stated repeatedly in subsequent comments, SA pro teams are in a much better position financially and in popularity terms in the URC than they were in SR. Why? Because they are playing full season, not just over half of one, and because they are in a weaker comp, and therefore doing better, which keeps the fans happy. Then they hit Europe and get steam rolled. The latter at least suggests that they haven't improved since SR, for all their claims to have developed "massive depth", a Trump grade exaggeration. They prioritize what they can win, URC, and their 2nd tier players get turned into custard in Europe.

The very fact that the rest of the URC is made up of teams from Italy and Wales, who are international whipping boys, Scotland, which never win anything, and Ireland, effectively a one club country, tells you everything you need to know about the URC. Other than Leinster, no Celtic League/URC team has qualified for the Euro Champ final since Ulster in 2012. The message is unmistakeable. The URC is a one team comp. Leinster. After that, a bunch of 2nd Tier teams who don't get anywhere against Toulouse etc. You don't want to recognise that inferiority, see what everyone else can see, that's fine. On the basis of your "we can't know" argument you might as well claim Japan's League One is in the same category as the Top 14.

But the way SA have structured their comps is, politically, extremely vulnerable to a decline in the Springboks. As soon as the Boks start losing again everything will be questioned. The 12 month season. Participation in the demonstrably inferior URC. Participation in Europe, where SA teams are getting smashed. Using players from Japan's League One, a third rate comp. The Springboks won the last world cup despite these problems, not because of them. SA Rugby understand the importance of being in a top competition. That's why they have expanded contacts with the All Blacks. NZ rugby's problems are entirely self created, but that means they can be fixed if there is the willingness to do what is necessary. SA is not so simple.

Personally, I don't know why SA don't run their own 6 team competition, then look for international club comp outside that. It would be far more popular in SA than URC/EURO, it would generate at least the same revenue, and it would solve the 12 month season problem. The last is the killer. NZ and Aussie wont shift TRC to suit SA, and the 6N wont let them in. Its completely unsustainable. Somethings gotta give.

I disagree about the RWC. As it turned out Ireland could have fielded a few subs v Scotland and still won. They still had the game to beat NZ in the QF.

I have now known of and followed Les Kiss’s progress for some 31 years. We had moved from Charters Towers, RL town, down to Bundaberg, also RL town. I took up supply teaching then, and began to spend a lot of time at the old and venerable Bundaberg State High, and on the wall of the school hall was this photo of Les Kiss, only boy from this old RL school to have played Origin and for Australia. I also met and worked with his Phys. Ed. teacher brother at another Bundaberg school.

Les retired from League in 1993, and I was intrigued when in 2001, it was announced he was switching to Union as a defence coach with the Boks. I was even more interested when he moved to my native Ireland in 2009, and under Declan Kidney, was part of the Grand Slam winning coaching team. Then he moved up to Ulster. I was born there, and had great hopes of Ulster rising to be a leading province, often “creaming” Leinster” which it was when I left Ireland in 1980. It was not to be.

Ulster is a funny old place, with some very difficult people to get on with. Les Kiss found this out I would think, and his time there was not that happy. I just feel he came into an environment there on the slide, one going back to moving Ulster coach Brian McLoughlin out, saying “We are moving on to the next level…..never happened under any coach.

His time at London Irish was, I thought, pretty successful against the backdrop of the resources he had, and a club that was headed for financial failure. I certainly felt when he came to Qld. it was going to be a step up, and it was. Until the playoff collapse against the Chiefs last year. Up to then he was my first choice to take over the WB’s job. Now I’m less sure, but will support him, as the die is cast.

But you can start weighing strengths and weaknesses with rose-tinted specs if deep down you believe you’re better than the oppo. That’s when you start missing things.

I doubt those at Leinster really believed Saints could hurt them as badly as they did.

Any inside word on the assistant coaches? I believe Fisher is moving on