Mike Stofile continues to embarrass the SARU administration. Somebody please keep him quiet.
There’s a test match to be played against England and Bok coach Jake White has accepted the Luke Watson issue. White doesn’t want Watson and doesn’t rate him, but he has agreed to lose this battle to ultimately win the war, which is to prepared for the World Cup without further political interference.
White has been big enough to agree to playing Watson, in a starting role, in the next month. And by all accounts Watson has been treated as fairly as every other player at the camp. If the player proves him wrong and excels the Bok coach is prepared to acknowledge that.
The principle of how wrong it was in the manner in which Watson was selected remains. White, like so many others (including myself), won’t relent on that. But it is an extraordinary situation that has to be tolerated because of the extraordinary manner in which things are done in South African rugby.
While the game’s administration has made fools of themselves in the last week, there was sanity in the form of SA Rugby Managing Director Jonathan Stones, who facilitated Sunday’s meeting between White, the selectors and SARU president Oregan Hoskins. Stones is all about common sense and the bigger picture of a achieving success at the World Cup without compromising the ideals of SARU.
White, at the meeting, took the Watson saga on the chin. He did not agree with it, but there was a compromise. He would accept the Watson situation if they accepted his authority to make decisions as a rugby coach. We move on.
Apparently not. Stofile, in his usual correspondence with Die Burger’s rugby writer Stephen Nell, lambasted White when he was told that Watson would be given one of the first three tests and perhaps one of the first two Tri Nations. Stofile said if this was the situation then White should be fired, claiming selections have to be made on merit.
What a bloody contradiction. Watson’s selection is not on merit. It has been forced on White by Stofile and Hoskins.
Stofile mouths off before having contacted Hoskins. Having told Nell White should be sent packing, he contacts Hoskins, who calms his deputy down by saying there is no such arrangement. Again we sit with a situation of economical truths. There was an arrangement and in the context of this most outrageous situation it was the most sensible and logical. Everyone wins, White and the Watsons.
Given that the Bok selection has been turned into a charity in the last year (read Solly Tyibilika and now Watson), a degree of common sense has prevailed.
For it to remain somebody at SARU should be bold enough to get on the blower to the deputy president and to tell him to shut up.
He continues to threaten the coach. He bad mouths the national captain at every turn, he plays selector every second week and he seeks the attention of the front page of the newspaper every second day. Springbok rugby does not need this kind of presidential bumbling and South African rugby does not need this kind of leadership.
Stones, in his short time, has brought calmness, but it doesn’t help when a voice of reason is drowned out by the Stofile storm every week.
Written by keo
*Disclaimer - Views expressed within this story are not necessarily the views of this Blog
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