Key Reasons for South Africa's Victory

The dust has settled from South Africa's victory in the World Cup final, in doing so becoming the first team to win the Rugby Championship (or previous incarnation the Tri-Nations) and the World Cup in the same year. The game has been analysed from every avenue by professional and amateur pundits alike. So there is probably nothing left to say about it really. Which means it's the perfect time for this blog to get its views on the result on the web. Keep reading to find the three takeaways from the final.

In a World Cup Final victory is decided by small margins, like opening strategies, physical size, or tiny halfbacks.

England stumble out the blocks
Before the tournament, I took a look at England, at noted that under Eddie Jones they've had two different plans to win a game. Initially, they built themselves to keep the game close, then utilise a high impact bench to win it in the final quarter. They evolved, in time for the global tournament, to win a game in the opening quarter, hell the opening ten minutes.  Eddie Jones is a master of writing an opening script, unleashing a salvo of runners before the game has fully warmed up. Strike hard, strike fast, get a lead and use the pressure of the scoreboard to force the opposition into mistakes. It worked perfectly against Australia, and New Zealand earlier on and they'd have been confident in it allowing them to overturn the Springboks.

Against NZ, England wrote a perfect opening line,
not looking back after Tuilagi scored.

South Africa had other plans. By winning the coin toss and electing to kick off South Africa had the opening advantage. Burying the ball deep into the 22, it meant England had to clear their lines and give the ball back to South Africa. Now South Africa could control the ball in England's half, and completely ruin Jones' script. Everything else that happened in the game came from this.

England are not a team designed to come from behind. Their whole strategy is to force the opponent into mistakes and live off of that. When the opposition is in the lead they don't have to push the envelope and make fewer mistakes. England couldn't adapt, and could never steal back the momentum.

Force meets Force
England were incredibly unfortunate with who they had to face in the final. Any other team they'd probably have run over on route to a famous victory. Instead, they ran into the only team capable of stopping them. Fashioned by the Rugby Gods as the perfect anti-power game team the Springboks were perfectly equipped to deal with England's "big" runners. Everyone and their aunt knows that England's gameplay is focused on their half a dozen huge ball carriers running off fly-halves and forcing one-on-one tackles in defence. Against the rest of the tournament, it was an unstoppable plan, England's men were bigger and stronger than the likes of Argentina, Australia, and New Zealand, and could regularly get over the gainline.

England struggled to make yards against an
imposing Springbok wall of muscle.

Then they ran into the brick wall made of biltong that is the South African defence. While other teams need two or three tacklers to be able to effectively stop the likes of Tuilagi and the Vunipolas, South Africa could take them on one on one and win. Vunipola was manhandled by Vermuelen, Tuilagi hunted down by de Allende, and Lawes stopped by Etzebeth. South Africa's set-piece claimed a lot of the credit for the win - and rightly so - but the raw physical size of the entire South African team meant they could meet England's power game head on and nullify it entirely.

While we're discussing South Africa's defence, there was a subtle addition that some people may have missed. Throughout the game du Toit, South Africa's flanker, spent the entire time with his eyes firmly fixed upon George Ford. While Farrell is the obvious leader and brains of the England team, Ford was the man who made everything go, with his late passing able to give his runners the best opportunity to get over the gain line. The Springbok coaches identified this and sent their biggest, fastest, most physical tackler at him time and time again. du Toit was intent on rattling Ford and sapping all confidence from him. Considering how little impact Ford had on the game, I think we can say, mission accomplished.

King de Klerk
Well respected rugby analyst Squidge Rugby brought an interesting fact to light shortly before the final. Every successful World Cup team has had a world-class scrum-half. From Aaron Smith of 2015, Matt Dawson of 2003, or even the legendary Joost van der Westhuizen back in '95, every world champion (of the professional era) has had a top-quality number nine. And so it proved again. While most chats of rugby usually descend into "who should play fly-half", the importance of the other half back can often be overlooked.

The scrum-half is the beating heart of any rugby side, while the ten may run the game, the scrum-half decides at what pace. Responsible for ordering around eight blokes bigger than him, and listening to

de Klerk's celebrations have already become
legendary, well deserved after a huge performance.

the desperate pleas from the backs for the ball, it is they who decide the fate of the ball more often than not.  The importance of the position was highlighted on Saturday. While Ben Youngs had a shocker of his game, one of his most disappointing in the white shirt, making consistently poor decisions and throwing questionable passes, Faf de Klerk had one of his finest in the dark green of the Rainbow Nation.

His box kicking was superb, even peak Conor Murray would have been proud of the range and precision of those kicks, the organisation of his runners was magnificent ensuring they were never in danger of getting isolated, and his snipes around the fringes kept the English blitz defence honest. While all that was commendable, the area the tiny blonde man stood out was his defence. Showing a blatant disregard for his own personal wellbeing, de Klerk was literally everywhere. Like a Duracell Bunny powered by a nuclear reactor, he covered so much ground, always appearing where he was needed. Making critical tackles in the wide channels moments after felling a forward in the middle of the pitch. There was one tackle on Jamie George that perfectly summed up his commitment to the team, where he went from marking Farrell, to covering a miss-pass, to helping complete a tackle on Curry, before bouncing on to the England hooker and forcing the ball into touch. It was a 5 second piece of play that could easily have been missed.

In the final, one team had a scrum-half at the top of the game, the other did not. If you want to win the World Cup, you need a world-class scrum-half. It's as simple as that.

South Africa's dominance at the scrum was just one facet of the game that ultimately lead to victory.

There are obviously plenty of other factors that led to South Africa's victory, the set piece, the goal kicking of Pollard, the defensive blitz of Lukhanyo Am, and the predatory finishing of South Africa's wingers. In games between two of the world's best teams, victory is decided by small factors adding up. In Japan all of them added up in South Africa's favour.