Schalk Burger: SA teams lack the ‘mindset’ for Champions Cup success as ex-Springbok wants Rassie Erasmus intervention

An understrength Stormers side struggling in the Champions Cup and former Springbok Robbie Fleck.

Springboks legend Schalk Burger believes that the Investec Champions Cup could go to another level if the South African franchises are able to be more successful in the competition.

Since 2021, SA Rugby have aligned their club game with the northern hemisphere after joining the United Rugby Championship (URC) and from 2022 they were accepted into the European competitions.

While the Stormers won the inaugural URC title and the other two finals have featured South African sides, they have failed to reproduce that in the Champions Cup.

No team has made it through to the knockouts this season with the Bulls, Sharks and Stormers all eliminated at the pool stages.

Quarter-final SA’s best result

Although Jake White’s men did reach the quarter-finals in 2023/24, they basically ended their hopes by sending a severely weakened team to Northampton Saints in the last-eight.

“It’s something we need to get right,” Burger said on the Boks Office podcast. “What was disappointing was the way it ended up with the Bulls sending a third-string side [to Northampton last season].

“They then lost that home game [to Saints again this season], which was gut-wrenching for them, but it’s tough with the squads that we’ve got in South Africa to compete on both fronts.”

Burger was joined on the show by fellow ex-Springbok Robbie Fleck, who wants to see a concerted effort within South Africa to improve their Champions Cup prospects.

That includes getting the likes of Boks head coach Rassie Erasmus involved given his ability to organise and set a plan in place to turn around the fortunes of ailing teams.

“Isn’t this a South African Rugby decision? So that’s all the franchises getting together and going, ‘right, we collectively are going to make a decision to compete in the Investec Champions Cup’,” Fleck said.

“In order to do that, we’re going to have to rest the Springboks at certain stages during the season, but we are all going to agree that we can have a proper crack at that competition.

“It is the best club competition in the world. I would think that is the competition that all players would like to play in, and coaches coach in. There’s so much history and it is the best rugby available to watch.

“But it would have to be a decision from Rassie and all the powers that be going, ‘let’s make a collective decision to tackle this competition’.”

Burger then chimed in, saying: “Just imagine one of our franchises playing in a big play-off out there, getting into a final and all of us legging it across to watch them play. You know, the competition will go to a different stratosphere having all of us fully invested into it.

“At the moment, because we’re not that successful, the South African public has been quite slow on the uptake. Our local derbies and some of the URC games, now four years in, are starting to form a bit of a trend.

“If we compete, you will see the likes of Antoine Dupont coming to Durban, coming to Cape Town to play rugby. The chances of seeing him do that for France is way slimmer than him doing it for his club.”

South African mindset

Burger ultimately believes that the South African franchises have not yet found the requisite “mindset” in comparison to Europe’s top teams, who are used to competing on two fronts.

“It’s a mindset. If you go to Toulouse or to Clermont or to La Rochelle, or Saracens when I was there, and Leinster, they’ve got the ability to separate the two comps,” he said.

“It’s not just another week, it’s European rugby, it’s the biggest thing we play – the Investec Champions Cup. That mindset is similar to Real Madrid in football.

“They pitch up in European rugby and they play at a different level that they would the week before. I think our South African sides will have to embrace that and find a way of how to compete against the best of Europe

“We definitely can, we’ve certain squads which I think will be able to compete once everyone’s playing – you think of the Sharks if they’ve got all of their 16 Springboks available.

“They could pitch up and beat any side but, unfortunately for us, we’re not there yet.”