He’s Never Started For Springboks, but South Africa is already in love with Him
Supremely gifted 22-year-old wears No 10 shirt for the first time on Saturday, and Bokke fans are hoping to witness the start of a new era
For the past couple of months South African supporters have been going absolutely gaga for Sacha, the talented 22-year-old from the Stormers who up until this week had not even made a Test start. That all changes in Brisbane on Saturday, when Feinberg-Mngomezulu will wear the Springbok No 10 shirt for the first time.
Slowing down a hype train is a thankless task but Rassie Erasmus gamely gave it a go this week, peaking with “this is an exciting opportunity for Sacha” while noting “we have some nice depth at ten”. Damian de Allende, whose comments before the Ireland series helpfully gave everyone plenty to chew over, was welcomingly more candid about the new fly-half.
“I hope he will be nice and composed because when he is, he is exceptional. I will try to help him keep his composure on the field and if he can just express himself and play his natural game, I think he will be amazing – a joy to watch.”
He’s right. Feinberg-Mngomezulu has been a constant highlight reel in South Africa’s Test matches this year. Take your pick when it comes to deciding the exact moment when Springbok supporters lost their minds about his potential; the penalty from inside his own half against Wales, how he handled being thrown on after two minutes in the second Test against Ireland, the swerving break to set up Makazole Mapimpi against Portugal, or a sensational 50:22 in the same Test.
Or it might have been a bit of remarkable footwork playing for the Stormers against the Lions last October, controlling a ball on the run with the kind of first touch that Phil Foden would have been happy with before regathering to score.
Maybe it’s just his ability to kick successfully at goal, given off days recently from the tee for Handre Pollard (costly in the loss to Ireland) and Manie Libbok. Opta revealed back in June that Feinberg-Mngomezulu surpassed his xGK (expected goalkicking success rate) by about 17 per cent in the United Rugby Championship regular season, landing 86 per cent of his kicks compared to his xGK of 69 per cent.
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Ben Loader, the former London Irish wing and now Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s team-mate at the Stormers, paints a picture of a young player extremely dedicated to his craft.
“He is one of the hardest-working players I have seen,” explains Loader. “The bits of magic you see in the games, they are built by his dedication through the week, the year, in the off-season.
“It’s his ability to try new things, to persevere. If something doesn’t come off, you will see him practicing it the next week over and over again to make sure the next time he tries it, it does come off.” The spiral bomb 50:22 against Portugal is one example of that hard work.”
Action at fly-half may have been limited – in fact Feinberg-Mngomezulu started almost of all of his games for the Stormers this year at inside centre apart from one appearance at full-back – but Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s confidence belies his years according to Loader, noting his triple threat as a runner, distributor and kicking option. Analysis from Opta, comparing Feinberg-Mngomezulu with other centres in the United Rugby Championship over the past two seasons, ranks him as one of the best centres for line breaks and try assists in the competition.
“I sometimes forget how young he actually is,” adds Loader. “We have seen in the first couple of Tests how comfortable he is. It looked like he was born to play Test rugby. A guy like that, who has confidence in his own ability but is also super humble, the sky is the limit for him.”
‘Adapt and change or we will die a slow death’
There is a bigger picture here. Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s attacking traits mesh well with this new era for South Africa under attack coach Tony Brown, purposefully trying to expand their repertoire with intricate attacking pods and dummy runners. That attack notably stalled against Ireland, a compliment to their ferocity at the breakdown, with Faf de Klerk left digging away into every ruck searching for his oval pal.
South Africa know how to win Rugby World Cups, using a successful template built on set-piece and kicking dominance combined with having the most effective bench in the business, with the added bonus of rapid finishers out wide when needed. That formula has worked twice in a row, but Erasmus is fully aware that the Springboks are an aging side and the next wave need to push through – handing out 11 new caps so far this year – and that over time their rivals will find a way to counter those strengths. “We have to adapt and change or we will die a slow death,” as he put it recently.
When Feinberg-Mngomezulu replaced Willie le Roux after two minutes in that second Ireland Test, as Erasmus later explained, South Africa traded what 34-year-old Le Roux does so well, his vision and ability to link the backline, for Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s “individual brilliance that’s not always structured”.
A strict structure has served South Africa so well in recent years, so this is a substantial shift. Now at Suncorp we get to see how Feinberg-Mngomezulu and Le Roux work as a combination, the blend of Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s instinctive attacking ability at the gain-line (averaging 5.7 defenders beaten per 80 minutes so far in Test rugby) with Le Roux’s organisational skills as a second receiver from full-back. First-time combinations are rarely perfect, but how can you not be intrigued?
Of course this is not the end for Handre Pollard, only 30 and named on the bench in Brisbane, with Erasmus clearly opting for a quicker half-back pairing of Cobus Reinach and Feinberg-Mngomezulu to try to run Joe Schmidt’s Wallabies off their feet. And yet it feels like a moment. One we may look back on when we are deep into the 2027 RWC in Australia as the time when South Africa fundamentally changed course and began to build around an enormously exciting talent in Feinberg-Mngomezulu who appears to have it all.
