Springbok captain, John Smit, is currently on a whirlwind book signing tour of South Africa. From Margate to Canal Walk, fans are arriving in their droves, just to get a glimpse of the global superhero and, God willing, an autograph.

Not that one should expect complete support at these events, as we witness this adorable group of people with a lot of time on their hands.

Bless..

Shame..

With promises to appear at every one of his Western Cape book signings, the one woman in the group was overheard taking Smit to task over the content in the book. In particular the section where she claims he referred to Luke Watson as “cancer.”

“No, no,” replied the Springbok Captain, “I said his conduct and presence within the squad was eating away at it… like a cancer. I said there was a ‘cancerous effect'”

The woman quipped, “but how can you as a Springbok captain publicly slate another Spprngbok?”

He dismissed the comment with, “if you read the whole book, you would have noticed the section where I actually commended him about some other things. I have remained truthful throughout my book and will leave it at that.”

Fair enough.

On that topic, I found this excerpt from Ruggaworld, commenting on the Luke Watson section of Smit’s book – Captain in The Cauldron:

As he wasn’t playing, it was a tough ask. Smit thought about what had gone wrong and judged that Luke Watson’s inclusion in the squad had been hugely divisive.

The son of “Cheeky” Watson, the anti-apartheid activist who forsook the chance of turning out for the Springboks to play his rugby with black players in the townships, Luke Watson had been forced on the previous coach, Jake White, by South African Rugby Union officials and now in 2008, many Springbok players were unhappy about his presence in the squad.

Smit felt that although Watson wanted to play for the Boks, he didn’t enjoy the environment. A bad situation was made worse by Watson rubbing his teammates the wrong way. Behind his back they called him “the cancer”, as they believed he poisoned the atmosphere.

For that do-or-die match against the Wallabies, he was a replacement and one of the 22 in the room when Smit began to speak. “There are 21 guys here who will bleed for each other,” he said, “and you have to understand that you can’t let one guy disrupt everything we’ve worked for as a team. We are bigger than this one guy, and he shouldn’t be allowed to affect how we feel about each other.”

As he spoke, Smit became more emotional. “Passion,” he said, “is not enough. You can talk about passion until the cows come home. Do you want to see passion?”

He then picked a glass from a nearby table and fired it against a wall. Fragments exploded in every direction, showering the players. “That is passion,” he said, “and it’s gone already. It’s over in a moment.”

Individual shows of passion from Watson or any other player, he was telling the group, were nothing compared to the collective will of a united team.

[more here]

Perhaps what the woman forgot to realise was that the fact that Watson wore that jersey in the first place was forced and the result of excessive duress. Perhaps things would have been different if he had earned it the natural organic way?

We are talking about a guy who often gets booed by his own home crowd.

CLICK HERE to buy John’s book, Captain in the Cauldron.

[thanks paul]