Rassie Erasmus: ‘I was willing to write Makazole Mapimpi off… I was stupid’

Rassie Erasmus reveals how he almost dropped Makazole Mapimpi from the Springboks squad.

Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus has revealed that he was willing to discard Makazole Mapimpi back in 2018 before assistant coach Mzwandile Stick’s intervention.

Mapimpi ranks third overall on the Springboks’ all-time leading try scorers list having dotted down 32 times in 46 Test matches since making his debut in 2018.

One of those 32 tries was in the Rugby World Cup 2019 final becoming the first South African to score a five-pointer in the final but he almost didn’t make it that far as Erasmus was willing to drop him from the squad as he did not believe that he was a ‘warrior’ and did not trust him.

This came after the winger had a poor outing in the 2018 Rugby Championship when South Africa fell to defeats to Argentina and Australia.

“Listen here no I don’t trust this guy”

Erasmus revisited that period with Stick on his podcast Rassie+ as he highlighted how a miscommunication almost cost Mapimpi his international career.

“People think there are no hiccups with understanding cultures, they think that we just work together and we’ve got a Springbok culture but in Springbok culture, we’ve got Muslims, Christians, black players, coloured players, white farm boys, so for me as an Afrikaans guy growing up in Dispatch, English was always foreign to me, I still struggle with it but for some boys speaking Afrikaans is a struggle, some boys are introverts, quiet, shy while other guys are good talkers,” Erasmus explained.

“So the thing that we always try to say is as long as you are a warrior, you’ve got a chance with us and we like to make guys feel safe in the team. Just one or two of the mistakes that I made where I understand the player. For example the Mapimpi thing. I was new as the Springboks coach because and it was also foreign.

“I gave Mapimpi a chance and because of what you [Stick] went through and you knew Siya and you know the mistakes, you’ve made the mistakes yourself, and you know when somebody gave you help or believed in you could turn it around

“Some guys you help and they don’t turn it around and those are the guys that unfortunately always say they had all the talent but they didn’t, they didn’t have the discipline part, they didn’t have all the talent.

“But with Mapimpi, I remember he caught the ball and then he rolled himself and he had two knock-ons in a row but he stayed on the field, stayed on the field and when we came into the room and we analysed the game – Mapimpi never spoke, I didn’t know if he could speak English in those days – but I was willing to write him off.

“We know what my Mapimpi eventually became but I sat in that meeting and I said, ‘Listen here, no, I don’t trust this guy’.”

Stick steps in

However, it was during this meeting that Stick revealed that Mapimpi was in fact playing with an injury that the doctor was assisting him with, something that Erasmus had not been made aware of.

The Bok head coach assumed that if a player is injured, then he would notify the coaches and come off the pitch. But instead, the winger played on.

“I knew through the doctor that he was carrying an injury,” Stick added.

“The communication between him and Mapimps, he kept saying ‘My knee, my knee’ and then the doc explained to me that he has got a problem with the cartilage. At that time, you [Rassie] hadn’t got that report yet and your frustration was that we lost and I remember we said that we always want to select warriors.

“So for you, it was a sign that Mapimpi wasn’t a warrior that after every tackle he was lying down and you were getting frustrated with that.

“I had to make sure, so I communicated with the doc and found out that he had a problem with his cartilage and I had a similar injury. What happens is you run with it but one bad movement locks your knee so Mapimpi would say ‘Pull my leg’ so once you pull it, you can run again.

“I remember we lost to Argentina and Australia away from home and then we targeted that game against New Zealand and Mapimpi was injured at the time. I think that’s when you had a proper chat with him.

“One thing that I know for sure in that meeting, you said ‘Mapimps, we understand that you’ve got this injury please do me a favour don’t be scared to go and fix your knee because you think you might not come back into our system again, we know what you can do.’

“Then probably in a space of two months, Mapimps was one of the most improved players in our system at that time… and within two months he was one of the loudest players talking-wise with our outside backs.”

“I was stupid”

Erasmus admits that he was wrong in this case as Mapimpi ultimately returned to play a pivotal role in the Springboks World Cup success in 2019 as well as the British and Irish Lions. He would also crack the squad for the 2023 World Cup but sustained an injury in the pool stages.

While the Bok boss told the speedster to get his knee sorted and then come back into the system, he added that it was only after he was wrong.

“Yes but first I had to get it wrong and say I don’t trust this guy,” he said. “This guy doesn’t talk, he just says ‘My knee, my knee’ and again that’s where I was stupid enough to think that a guy will stay on in a Test match and try to make it but not see the actual warrior and we will trust the guy to come off of his injured but he didn’t even know how bad his injury was.

“I guess that’s what say if you didn’t help me out then say let me talk with the guy, Mapimpi might not have been the Mapimpi he is today just one little miscommunication saved us there.”