Last month, England international Courtney Lawes made headlines when he dished out a cheap shot at South Africa and the Bulls.
His comments came after the Bulls were embroiled in an unexpected saga as coach Jake White selected a weakened side for a Champions Cup knockout game against the Northampton Saints, which is the club Lawes plays for.
“It’s a very South African thing to do, with the whole carnival around it,” Lawes told former rugby player Jim Hamilton on the Rugby Pod. “Putting things out in the press that there are eight different flights, but I can guarantee you that it wasn’t eight different flights.
“The players got there at pretty much the same time, with the staff coming in at different times, but a lot of things were exaggerated. It was a great way of taking pressure off themselves, disrupting us, and getting us thinking about different things.”
Eben Etzebeth hits back
However, these comments have clearly not gone down well with Springbok forward Eben Etzebeth.
“The Bulls got a lot of criticism their way and unfairly I think. Obviously, I saw some players like Courtney Lawes mentioning something, and that’s a ‘South African way’, I don’t know why he mentioned the whole of South Africa,” Etzebeth said.
“He surely doesn’t know what’s going on in South Africa, so he must rather keep his mouth shut. It’s Jake’s call. If you’re head coach, you must be able to select whoever you want to. In the Champions Cup and Challenge Cup, if you reach the top four and you don’t have a home semi-final, then the chances of you winning that comp is really low,” Etzebeth added.
“They had to go away in the quarters and then probably go to Leinster and then play again in Europe against maybe Toulouse, so it’s always going to be difficult.”
What is quite notable about the response from Etzebeth is that it effectively follows the advice given by coach Rassie Erasmus.
At the end of the popular Chasing the Sun 2 documentary, Erasmus explained how he told the players after winning the 2023 World Cup that they should not allow people to speak disparagingly about South Africa.
In the blunt words of Erasmus, he stated that outsiders should “stop talking sh*t about our country”, and he insisted that people should be brought into line when they do.
This is exactly what Eben Etzebeth has effectively done in refusing to allow Lawes to take a dig at South Africa and the Bulls.
WHITE INSISTED IT WAS NEVER ABOUT DISRESPECTING THE CHAMPIONS CUP
After the game that the Bulls lost heavily, White also sought to set the record straight.
“I’ve got to stress, because I think people are reading it completely wrong that I’m not whinging about being here, in fact I’m loving this competition. I’m loving the fact that we get exposed to this and I’m loving that these players can learn what they learned tonight,” White explained when asked about the supposed “disrespect”,” he told reporters.
“It is so close to test rugby. I mean maybe the style varies a little bit, being less conservative and pragmatic compared to test rugby but the intensity is there and is the fight to win. So I want to be clear that we want to be here in this competition.
“We want to win and be that powerful side that can run out every weekend and be competitive, but you need to serve your time. It’s the second year we’ve been playing in this competition. For some guys, it’s the first time they ever flew business class. For others, it’s the first time they’ve ever come overseas, so when you put that in perspective, it demonstrates we still have a way to go.”