Why the Springboks will win the Rugby Championship

The Springboks have a great shot at winning the abbreviated Rugby Championship in 2023, just as they did in 2019.

Jacques Nienaber’s side will play two of their three Rugby Championship tests at home at the fortresses of Loftus and Ellis Park.

SPRINGBOKS VS ALL BLACKS IN AUCKLAND THE KEY MATCH

The critical match for the Springboks will be their raid on Eden Park in New Zealand.

That meeting with the All Blacks is the one likely to settle the fate of the Rugby Championship.

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Not that the Springboks can afford to be complacent at home against very good sides in Australia and Argentina that each pose a unique challenge.

However, the Springboks have not won at Eden Park since 1937 and it is clearly the main target of the team in the Rugby Championship to knock over their biggest rivals in a Rugby World Cup year.

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In 2019 the critical fixture between the Springboks and All Blacks played in Wellington saw the visitors snatch a draw late on thanks to an opportunistic try by Herschel Jantjies.

The Springboks have proven down the years that they can absorb Rugby Championship losses to New Zealand and go on to Rugby World Cup glory but that is only Rassie Erasmus’ plan B.

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KNOCKING THE ALL BLACKS OFF THEIR PERCH

Plan A is to pull off a rare win at Eden Park on either side of dogged defences of their highveld fortresses and sweep to just a second Rugby Championship title.

While the Springboks very definitely have their eyes on the Rugby World Cup prize, it has been the stated ambition of the top brass that challenging the All Blacks Rugby Championship dominance is a primary long-term goal.

The All Blacks are becoming less and less familiar with the evolving South African game which adds another very intriguing dimension to this contest.

The blockbuster clash at Eden Park will take the temperature of a rivalry that likely hasn’t cooled despite the new distance between the nations at a franchise level.

We might expect something a little bit different from both the Springboks and the All Blacks in this contest.

However, it is still just as likely to be an arm-wrestle of a Test that gives little away when it comes to these two sides’ plans for the Rugby World Cup.

CALL IT: A DRAW!

Drawn matches in Test rugby are now such a rarity that predicting one is almost always seen as a wild stab in the dark but the Eden Park clash is ripe for another stalemate if these two sides effectively cancel one another out.

A draw is likely to favour the Springboks who otherwise play their two matches at home and such a result would mirror what happened the last time the Rugby Championship was abbreviated.

SPRINGBOKS SCHEDULE KINDER

The All Blacks will go on to face a tough Bledisloe Cup Test against Australia the week after, while a very different Springbok side will be put together to neutralise the Pumas.

New Zealand could be faced with the prospect of not being able to rotate as much as they would like in matches against the Springboks and Wallabies.

Put together there are enough factors that point towards the Springboks winning their second Rugby Championship title in 2023.