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Rassie Erasmus receives glowing endorsement from president of South Africa

After three matches in charge, new Springboks head coach has received a ringing endorsement from His Excellency Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s current president.

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“I just wanted firstly to thank you, on behalf of the country, for having such a great success in the Tests that you’ve run against England,” Ramaphosa is seen telling Erasmus over the phone in a video from SABC News.

“We are very, very proud. The achievement has been phenomenal and the performance of your team has been truly, truly outstanding and you’ve made us very, very proud. Extremely proud.”

“I’m sorry that I’ve not been able to have time to attend any of the matches, but I know that even in my absence I knew that you would be carrying the support and the great spirit of the people of South Africa so we want to thank you,” Ramaphosa continues.

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“Secondly, we want to wish you the very best for tomorrow’s Test. I have no doubt that you are going to be able to excel and teach the Brits once more a good lesson. You have put together an outstanding squad and you have been doing very well, and we are all very proud of you.”

45-year-old former Springbok loose forward Erasmus was named South Africa’s new Director of Rugby in June 2017 after coaching stints with Irish PRO14 club Munster and the Bulls and Cheetahs Super Rugby sides.

Erasmus represented South Africa 36 times as a player between 1997 and 2001, captaining the side once.

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His inaugural Test series in charge of the national side will conclude Saturday evening, as his Springboks attempt to sweep England 3-0 at Newlands.

In other news:

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J
JW 1 hour ago
Why England's defence of the realm has crumbled without Felix Jones

This piece is nothing more than the result of revisionist fancy of Northern Hemisphere rugby fans. Seeing what they want to see, helped but some surprisingly good results and a desire to get excited about doing something well.


I went back through the 6N highlights and sure enough in every English win I remembered seeing these exact holes on the inside, that are supposedly the fallout out of a Felix Jones system breaking down in the hands of some replacement. Every time the commentators mentioned England being targeted up the seam/around the ruck or whatever. Each game had a try scored on the inside of the blitz, no doubt it was a theme throughout all of their games. Will Jordan specifically says that Holland had design that move to target space he saw during their home series win.


Well I'm here to tell you they were the same holes in a Felix Jones system being built as well. This woe is now sentiment has got to stop. The game is on a high, these games have been fantastic! It is Englands attack that has seen their stocks increase this year, and no doubt that is what SB told him was the teams priority. Or it's simply science, with Englands elite players having worked towards a new player welfare and management system, as part of new partnership with the ERU, that's dictating what the players can and can't put their bodies through.


The only bit of truth in this article is that Felix is not there to work on fixing his defence. England threw away another good chance of winning in the weekend when they froze all enterprise under pressure when no longer playing attacking footy for the second half. That mindset helped (or not helped if you like) of course by all this knee jerk, red brained criticism.

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