The All Blacks scored 142 points and conceded 40 across three warm-up matches — Kirwan believes that was arranged.
Sir John Kirwan spent a chunk of his Rugby Rivals podcast this week arguing that Rassie Erasmus had rigged the All Blacks’ warm-up matches. Then he said he would have done exactly the same thing. Both halves came out of the same conversation, and only the first one has travelled.
The claim is straightforward. Kirwan believes Erasmus instructed the Stormers, Sharks and Bulls to play nothing like the Springboks — no contestable kicking, no corner-seeking, none of the mauling New Zealand had spent three weeks preparing for — so the tourists would arrive at Ellis Park with a false picture of what is coming. His word for it was “conspiracy”.
His evidence was the kicking game, or the absence of one. He questioned whether the Bulls had used a box kick at all, allowing only that there had been a few loose kicks through midfield. His argument was that no South African coach would voluntarily try to beat the All Blacks at their own game, and that any coach who did should be sacked on the spot.
It is a good line. It is also not the argument he finished with.
What he said next
A few minutes later Kirwan turned on his own case.
Erasmus kept the bulk of his squad in camp rather than releasing them to the franchises, and Kirwan’s verdict on that was “I would do exactly the same if I was Rassie”. He called the situation sad for the relationship between the two unions and for the tour itself, and said the cost showed in the stands — South African supporters had not turned up for matches they knew were not real.
That reframes the whole complaint. Kirwan is not accusing Erasmus of cheating. He is saying that four Tests have been bolted onto three fixtures nobody wanted, and that the Springboks were never going to treat the warm-ups as anything other than an inconvenience to be managed.
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Matfield did not buy it
Kirwan’s co-host, former Springboks lock Victor Matfield, disagreed — though not on the ground you would expect.
Matfield did not claim the franchises played their natural game. He argued that Erasmus was right to hold his players back, that Saturday is the only fixture that matters, and that every man still in camp remains in contention for a matchday shirt. He also noted that Erasmus did release Johan Grobbelaar and Elrigh Louw, and that both changed the second half they entered.
His explanation for the standard of the warm-ups was structural rather than tactical: South African provincial depth is not what it was fifteen or twenty years ago, because the players who would once have filled those teams are now contracted in Europe and Japan.
That answers Kirwan’s question without requiring anyone to have been given instructions. A squad drawn from what is left after the Test group and the overseas exodus does not run a kick-chase system. It plays the simplest version of what it knows.
What the tour matches were worth
Very little, on the numbers.
| Opponent | Venue | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Stormers | DHL Stadium, Cape Town | 38-21 |
| Sharks | Hollywoodbets Kings Park, Durban | 54-0 |
| Bulls | Loftus Versfeld, Pretoria | 50-19 |
| Total | 142-40 |
Dave Rennie used 41 players getting there — an admission in itself that the tour was a selection exercise rather than a contest. Both coaches were managing minutes towards the same Saturday. Only one of them is being asked to explain it.
Saturday
Kick-off at Ellis Park is 17:10 SAST: 16:10 BST, 01:10 AEST and 03:10 NZST on Sunday morning. Matthew Carley of the RFU referees. It is the 111th Test between the two nations and the first of four, with the third at FNB Stadium and the fourth in Baltimore.
The needling has not been confined to the podcast. Springboks assistant coach Felix Jones has raised questions over the legality of New Zealand’s breakdown work after debriefs with the three franchises. Rennie has said Erasmus declined a pre-match meeting with the match officials. Erasmus has held his matchday 23 back until Thursday rather than naming it early in the week, with Siya Kolisi‘s fitness unresolved.
The All Blacks have won six Tests at Ellis Park, the most recent 35-23 in 2022. The fixture has moved a long way in the other direction since.
Kirwan is right that the warm-ups were worthless as evidence. He is also right that he would have done the same. What nobody has explained is why a series built on four Tests needed three matches neither coach wanted to win properly — and that question belongs to the people who sold the schedule, not to Erasmus.
