Duane Vermeulen in action for the Springboks during the Rugby Championship Duane Vermeulen in action for the Springboks during the Rugby Championship. Photo: Shaun Roy/BackpagePix
Durban — To borrow from Shakespeare, it must be a case of uneasy lies the head that wears the crown for Springbok warrior Duane Vermeulen as he feels the heat building from his chief competitor for the No.8 spot at the World Cup later this year, Jasper Wiese.
Wiese, the incredibly humble Afrikaner from Upington, on Wednesday was named the best player in England by his fellow professionals in the English Premiership.
The 27-year-old was on the shortlist for the same award last year and it was for that reason that Wiese was picked to play No.8 in eight of the Springboks’ 13 Test matches in 2022, while he played off the bench in another.
The 36-year-old Vermeulen played in just four Tests in 2022, two of them off the bench. He was missing from the action because of injuries and it was Wiese that was preferred by coach Jacques Nienaber when most of South Africa was rooting for Evan Roos, who was shooting the lights out with the Stormers.
Roos is still in the frame but compared to last year, Wiese has certainly entrenched himself above the youngster on the No.8 ladder.
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But who will start in France? It will take a lot for Nienaber and Rassie Erasmus to depose Vermeulen and when Siya Kolisi’s knee injury shocked South Africa a few weeks back, the talk of who would lead the Boks at the World Cup was mostly around Vermeulen.
Vermeulen, who will turn 37 in the week that the Boks play Australia on July 8 in Pretoria, commands enormous respect in the Springbok set-up.
We should not forget the words of the Ulster coach, Dan McFarlane two months ago when Vermeulen captained the Belfast team to a 31-24 victory over the Sharks in a URC match in Durban.
“Can he still go to the World Cup? Of course, he can,” the coach said. “We saw today how good he is. This is a guy who not long ago made three massive plays against the All Blacks. That is what Duane does — he is the best mauler in the world and when the team needs a vital play to be made, he is the one who will make it happen.
“He might not be the all singing, all dancing, carry-the-ball 16 times a game player (of his youth) but, man, the influence he has on games is phenomenal,” McFarland explained. “He still puts the fear of God into the opposition and we scored three maul tries against the Sharks because of him steering the ship.”
Meanwhile, over the Premiership season, Wiese scored six tries for Leicester and made 130 tackles, 11 offloads, and 218 carries —the fourth-highest in the Premiership.
Wiese has said his game has gone up to another level because he was given a hammering by coach Steve Borthwick (who has now taken the England job vacated by Eddie Jones) because of his poor discipline. As well as Wiese had been playing, he was often over-exuberant in his tacking and suffered a succession of yellow and red cards.
Wiese says Borthwick told him the team could not afford to keep playing matches down to 14 men.
“There were some stern words from the coach and it had the desired effect,” admitted Wiese.
So will it be Jasper or Duane, or even Evan? We will find out in time but whichever way it goes the No 8 jersey will be in good hands.
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