2oceansvibe’s bi-weekly sports columnist, Sean Wilson, gives us the low-down on last weekend’s disappointing international rugby test against England, considers Morne du Plessis kissing one’s sister, gives a heads up to the fickle Port Elizabeth crowd, and fires off a warning to Pat Lambie’s hair stylist.

1. Sometimes Morne du Plessis’s quote about sisters doesn’t cut it

Whenever a draw comes up in rugby, everyone brings up Morne du Plessis’s emotionless response when the Currie Cup was shared in 1979 and he famously said that a draw is like kissing your sister. For South Africans, watching that test on Saturday was way worse than kissing your sister. It was more like kissing your grandmother, or that aunt of yours that smells a bit.

It’s high time we forget about this ridiculous quote once and for all. South Africans have all got so carried away with how much they revere du Plessis that they haven’t bothered to stop and think how nonsensical the statement really is. What would people think if Peter de Villiers was the first person to say that? It would only be a biblical reference and a tutu short of  the “Craziest Rugby Quote of All Time Award” (which, as rugby awards go, would be a particularly competitive category).

However, there is a possibility that we’ve misunderstood the quote all these years. When du Plessis uttered “It’s like kissing your sister”  into the Topsport microphone after the match, he might not have meant one’s own sister. He might have been referring specifically to the interviewer’s sister, the late Zandberg Jansen. If so, it must be credited as an incredible act of veiled criticism and celebrated as a catchphrase right up there with “Nag, ou grote” itself.

2. Currently, England’s expectations are lower than they’ve been for a while

Yes, it’s a very young England team. Yes, they did show some defensive character, and yes, it was raining. But it seems a little over the top to rate that English performance as successful, or even acceptable. After all, it took two to tango to that dirgeful ditty everyone called a test match.

Compare the reactions of the two great rugby nations after they’d drawn with each other. South Africa is furious. People have to force themselves to analyze the test as a whole because it’s hard to distinguish one moment from the other in a sea of errors, sluggish phase play and bad decision-making. Heyneke Meyer has basically had to issue a public apology while his selection and tactics are taken to task, as everyone worries about what needs to change before the Springboks play the likes of New Zealand.

Whereas the English seem very pleased with a performance that matched the Springbok one. They saw the game as a sign of the future being very bright and how England are definitely, certainly on the right path to success. Man of the match (like that’s a title to be proud of) Danny Care went as far as to say that the performance showed that they are able to beat the best in the world.

Whoah, let’s back it up a little, Danny. It was a performance that showed you can draw with a team ranked third in the world when they’ve already won the series and are playing horribly in the notoriously hard to win “dead rubber”. It’s a performance that’s far, far off beating the All Blacks.

The previous regime clearly hit English rugby very hard. It’s been eight test matches since they left the World Cup in a drunken ferry-jumping, dwarf-tossing haze, and they still seem to be at square one by their historical standards. Coach Stuart Lancaster still has plenty of questions to answer, while rejected interviewee Nick Mallett watches it from the studio. Hopefully England will soon be at a point where they will be able to expect a lot more.

Oh, and before you point out that English expectations must have been mighty low before their last tour to South Africa in 2007 (where the Springboks  reached 50 points in both tests), let me remind you that they went into that tour well aware that the majority of their top players were unavailable. There were 11 changes between the teams that played the second test in Pretoria and the team that made the World Cup final.

3. Port Elizabeth might not be such a fortress for the Springboks

A statistic that every South African was quick to trot out before the test match was South Africa’s impeccable record at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, where they won their only game there against New Zealand last year. As any decent statistician knows, making an assessment like that using a sample of only one game is a few sandwiches short of a picnic, or at the very least a few quadratic coefficients short of a parabola.

The atmosphere before the game seemed wonderful and the singing of the anthems looked like a moment to savour, but it’s fair to say that the Friendly City fell short of offering the Springboks the best support. Just ask Morne Steyn.

Poor Steyn is clearly short on confidence as it is. You can see it whenever he lines up a kick for poles. He stares at the uprights with a nervous, almost confused look on his face. Like a man standing up in a board meeting in front of potential investors, about to give a presentation he’s forgotten to prepare for while simultaneously worrying that he might have left the oven on. Regardless of how one feels about his play, it’s definitely not beneficial for his own fans to boo him.

A word of advice, Port Elizabeth: you might want to lower your boo-barometer by the time you get to see your Super Rugby franchise play. If you think some aspects of Saturday’s play were unacceptable by your standards, you might be in for a shock next year.

4. In Jacques Potgieter, Patrick Lambie might have a hair to the throne

Yes, Jacques Potgieter fell short of the human wrecking ball standards set by Willem Alberts, but what a set of hair!

There was a fear that the South African management would insist that Potgieter’s locks needed to be given the respectable short back and sides treatment before his test debut, but thankfully the slick, black mane was left unscathed for all the rugby world to enjoy.

If you liked that, then CLICK HERE to read the rest of the story and catch more of Sean’s insight’s over at www.SimplySean.co.za!