Savea wants All Blacks to go ‘bang’, Boks will have their Bomb Squad

The question of whether the fiercest rugby rivalry will be scaled down a notch on Friday has been raging in the background as the Springboks and All Blacks prepare to do battle in their Rugby World Cup warm-up match at Twickenham.

Some have dismissed the clash as insignificant in the same way the teams’ matchup at the 1999 World Cup left their respective fan bases cold.

Having been knocked out on a seismic double-header weekend (also at Twickenham) the Springboks and All Blacks may have preferred to head to Heathrow but instead had to travel a lot further west.

They had to make the 256km trip across the Severn Bridge to Cardiff, not to play in the final, but in the third and fourth place play-off, a match that for them must have felt more pop gun than top gun.

Naturally a pall descended over both camps after their defeats by Australia and France. That hollow feeling remained in the build-up to the game.

The match was far from memorable with Breyton Paulse’s opportunistic try proving the decisive moment as the Boks prevailed 22-18.

For Paulse, who scored a hat-trick of tries earlier that year on debut against Italy, there was a six Test wait before he could get his name on the score sheet again. That game meant a lot to him.

Similarly for Kurt-Lee Arendse, perhaps a modern day incarnation of Paulse, Friday night’s match has meaning. If he adds to his already remarkable try-scoring record it will be hard to leave him out of the Boks’ team for their World Cup opener against Scotland.

Friday’s game comes with added angst. Two teams who usually test the other’s physical boundaries will run head-on into each other on the cusp of the World Cup.

The potential for peril will be ever present.

However, if there was a suggestion the pair of three-time World Cup winners may go a little easy on each other, it was quickly dispelled by two of the toughest players on each side.

Bok lock and general enforcer Eben Etzebeth made it clear the match will carry a sense of occasion.

“Playing for your country in the Springbok jersey in a neutral environment at Twickenham, one of the best stadiums in the world, with probably 80,000 people against probably SA’s biggest rivals the All Blacks, if you ask anyone out there you’ll get the same answer.

“It is a Test match against the All Blacks. We are going to give our everything to win the Test match. We will worry about the World Cup after Friday.

“Hopefully it goes well and if it does it builds a bit of confidence for the World Cup as well.”

If the Boks are going to try to play like there is no tomorrow, All Blacks hardman Ardie Savea argued the concept of a warm-up Test is foreign to them.

“It’s not part of our vocabulary. We want to go out there firing and banging,” said Savea. “For me, every Test is hard, and that’s just an internal gut feeling I put upon myself. The standard in every game is hard and tough and you want to be prepared for that and playing this game against SA leading up to what is next is important.”

A look at the respective teams, especially the All Blacks, also leaves the distinct impression they are edging towards what they deem their best starting team.

Among their forwards the Boks are packing heavy hitting experience with all their starters boasting 62 caps or more. They know the business needs to be done upfront. The assembly of those forwards is a statement of intent.

Interestingly though, none of the backs has reached the 50-cap mark.

Despite the return of 15-capped flank Luke Jacobsen, the All Blacks have also assembled a pack with more than 500 caps.

Even if they have a few caps fewer up front than the Boks, they mean business in the assembly of Beauden Barrett, Will Jordan, Rieko Ioane, Jordie Barrett, Mark Telea, Richie Mo’unga and Aaron Smith in their back division.

Soon after kickoff the notion that the match will be decided over friendly fire will be shot to pieces.