Are Ulster right to go after 'box-office' Bok? - Neil Best

When confirmation of Ulster’s pursuit of Elton Jantjies first surfaced in the Belfast Telegraph courtesy of @JBradleyBT earlier this week, murmurings started to come back from South Africa with a question -are Ulster chasing the right South African ten?

Getting a non-Irish qualified fly-half approved by decision makers at the IRFU will be a huge task in itself – so if it is going to happen it’s important Ulster get the right man. For the time being I’ll set aside the cynic in me that suspects Ulster may have leaked this gossip to distract from domestic woes, and in full knowledge the IRFU wont sanction it.

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But Ulster do have a long history or signing South Africans either as NIQ or project players -those with the capacity to become Irish qualified at some point. In the past some of those South Africans have been legends of the game with players like Johann Muller and Ruan Pienaar gracing Ravenhill.

More recently the quality of NIQs has been patchy to say the least. Schalk Van der Merwe and Jean Deysel arrived at the beginning of the season to add to Marcell Coetzee -in his second year at Ulster. And Bryn Cunningham -the man responsible at Ulster for player recruitment and retention – was clearly pleased with his handywork when he told the Belfast Telegraph that in addition to the signing of Deysel “when you add in a fit-again Marcell (Coetzee), Schalk (van der Merwe) arriving to add strength to the front-row competition……the signs are good for a more robust and dominant forward pack for next season.”

But between them (across two seasons) they’ve managed only twenty-one appearances – no great return on investment. Even Kiwi-born Jared Payne is widely considered a success but likely to be subject to injury-enforced early retirement, has managed only seventy-eight appearances for Ulster since 2011.

In the same timeframe he managed twenty appearances for Ireland.

And it was in part that growing reputation for signing crocks that caused Ulster to pull out a deal for Arno Botha last year. Ironically, they took Jean Deysel from Munster instead of Botha. And Botha is now joining Munster to replace Gerbrandt Grobler, the player Munster brought in for Deysel’s slot.

So who is this potential South African alternative to Jantjies? Sources have suggested highly regarded Jean-Luc du Plessis would make a much better fit for Ulster. The Stormers ten is three years younger than Jantjies and yet to play for the Springboks.

But one note of caution given Ulster’s recent record of foreign signings – Du Plessis too has had some significant recent injury problems and only made a return to play for Western Province last month – although he did bag a couple of tries on his return. Since the beginning of May he has been back involved with the Stormers and started last weekend’s reverse to the Sunwolves in Hong Kong.

Naturally some at Ulster will see Jantjies as “box office” and capable of boosting flagging season ticket sales. But Ulster went box office two seasons ago with Charles Piutau and it didn’t really pay off.

They overlooked other squad weaknesses to acquire a player where they already had some capacity. This time round the need to strengthen where they are weakest and not just sign the biggest name available irrespective of need. And most importantly of all they should only recruit those who really want to play for the shirt -for Ulster.

If a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.