The Springbok Women are not looking at permutations or wishing for a potential opponent in next weekend’s Women’s Rugby World Cup quarter-finals as they came to England to compete and play against the best.
That is the view of Laurian Johannes-Haupt, one of the Bok Women’s assistant coaches, as they fine-tune prepararions to face France in Northampton on Sunday in the Pool D decider.
The winner of the Franklin’s Gardens clash will play the team finishing second in Pool C and whether it will be the defending champions, New Zealand, or Ireland, it is all the same for them, according to Johannes-Haupt.
The Black Ferns take on Ireland in Brighton and Hove on Sunday. Both sides have taken a maximum of 10 points from their first two games, but New Zealand (+89) have the edge over Ireland (+44) on points’ difference, so they look likely to top the pool in the event of a draw.
“That is a week from now, but we certainly don’t mind who we play in the quarters as the nature of the competition is that it gets tougher the further you progress,” said Johannes-Haupt.
“We want to play the best, in this case we are playing the number four and then a week later the number three or five in the world. That is what we came for.”
For Sunday, when they play France and with a quarter-final spot already in the bag, the Bok Women are not going to merely participate, but to compete and go for the win, she said.
“They are fourth on the world rankings and finished second in the Six Nations, and they have massive experience of tournaments like the World Cup,” she said.
“They certainly are as good as either of next week’s opponents, so this will be a nice dress rehearsal for us.”
Johannes-Haupt said the fact that they are into the playoffs already changed some aspects of their approach, like team selection, but the main thing remains that – to deliver their best performance ever against France.
“We trained against France on our tour in April and that helped a lot, as the players could see some pictures and now know what to expect in certain areas of the game,” the SA coach explained.
“It was just a training session, but we took a lot of positives out of that. The good momentum we have gained in the last couple of months are added incentives for us to go at them hard and with purpose.”
The Springbok Women side to face France will be named on Friday and Johannes-Haupt predicted some changes: “We want to play against them with a particular tactic in mind, so the team will be tweaked accordingly. It will be silly to move away from our direct and physical approach that worked so well in recent months, but we will freshen up the squad after three weeks on tour.
“The nice thing is that everyone is keen to go out and prove our performances are sustainable and that the massive support we get from back home is justified and celebrated.”