Rassie hails Boks' new-found depth ahead of World Cup

Rassie Erasmus believes the Springboks are in a much better place with the Rugby World Cup looming than they were at this point four years ago.

As all Bok fans know, South Africa went on to win the 2019 World Cup in Japan after thumping England in the final, so the fact that their former head coach-turned Director of Rugby feels they now have much more depth available when it comes to picking their squad than they did prior to their previous World Cup success, should give great cause for optimism.

While the goal for the Boks following their 2019 triumph was always to start blooding new players and developing depth at every position, the arrival of the Covid pandemic in 2020, coupled with the immediate requirement to be competitive against the Lions and in the Rugby Championship the following year, meant they weren't able to put their plans into motion as quickly as they'd hoped.

However, Erasmus and head coach Jacques Nienaber were able to use this past year to experiment and test out a number of new players, and while it did mean that the Boks weren't always able to show the consistency in results they would have liked, it does leave them in a very healthy position with the World Cup less than a year away.

"In 2020, we'd were supposed to play two Tests against Scotland and we were also going to play against Georgia, which would have been a soft landing after the 2019 World Cup. We'd have been able test new players in those games, but ultimately 2020 was just gone due to Covid," Erasmus explained in an interview with Rapport.

"In 2021, we couldn't catch up with what we had planned for 2020, because you only play the British & Irish Lions every 12 years. After that series, we had the Rugby Championship and to make things more complicated, Covid19 was at its worst last year.

"We wanted to blood in young players to test at the highest level against different opponents and we finally did that this year. People say now that we have depth in almost every position, it'll be difficult to pick a 33-man squad for the World Cup, but it's actually easier.

"The difficulty in selection lies in not having options, like 2018 for example, when we only had one scrumhalf and not three to pick from.

"Having this kind of depth is super exciting and all the players have been given road maps they have to work on. In the end, the 33 guys will be selected on the technical and fundamental strength of the progress they've done in terms of their road maps."