There are few sides in the world that know Wellington’s Westpac stadium like the Springboks, but come Sunday’s Rugby World Cup opener against Wales, the Boks will have to contend with the weather as much as they have to slay the Welsh dragons.
Bok captain John Smit even joked at the team’s welcoming ceremony that, being his fourth visit to Wellington this year, he knew his New Zealand mobile number better than his South African one.
But whether that knowledge will help the Boks as they contend with poor weather conditions to open their Rugby World Cup account is a moot point.
Strong winds gusted into Wellington on Thursday, topping 80kph in the afternoon as the clear, fresh and cool weather the Boks have been experiencing since arrival slowly turns towards rainy conditions ahead of the game.
The weather forecast has predicted rain from Friday, with winds dying down on Saturday and picking up again on Sunday.
Wellington, notorious for the swirling wind in the stadium, is set to roll out conditions that will test both sides as they look for an opening victory to set the trend at this World Cup.
And this will mean that an open flowing game will be less of a likely spectacle than one where teams use tactical kicking as the order of the day.
The Boks will be very happy with this series of events, but even as the wind began to gust, utility back Ruan Pienaar reminded all that there was little way to prepare.
“The wind is different in the stadium than it is on the training ground. It swirls,” Pienaar said in reference to the stadium known locally as “the Cake Tin”.
Bok assistant coach Dick Muir added his bit, saying that while the Boks had asked for an elevated and windy training ground, it helped only minorly in replicating the conditions they would experience on Sunday.
“The kicking game is always affected by the wind. The ground where we train is elevated and there is a lot of wind around there. You don’t quite get the practice that you want. We practiced our kicking game on Monday and we did what we had to. But the wind is getting stronger and we’re certainly expecting it to swirl,” Muir said.
Either way the Boks might be more familiar with the conditions, but the wind may have more than just a minor impact when the teams run onto the field on Sunday.
