We are always hearing about the pretty boys, here's a good one for our resident Pigs to read

Toil not glory is Guy's virtue

Rupert Guinness
Friday, July 6, 2007

Guy Shepherdson admits he dared to dream when he charged over the All Blacks line at the MCG in Melbourne last Saturday for an attempted try. He was also dirty on himself for a long time because he failed.

"I lacked a bit of composure there. It's not often you get a chance to sniff a try as a front-rower," said the Wallabies tight-head prop of his foiled bid for a five-pointer in the 46th minute. "I have replayed that moment over and over in my head. Next time, I will just pass the ball on and clean out.

"It's good to display a pretty good workrate around the field and get your hands on the pill a bit … it's a bonus. But your job as a tight-head is to shore up the scrum. That is, first and foremost, the most important thing."

It is that sort of self-criticism that Wallabies forwards coach Michael Foley says has helped Shepherdson, who has 15 Test caps since his debut against Ireland last year, develop into one of the best tight-heads in Australia.

"The nice thing about 'Shep' as a tight-head is that he is a true tight-head," Foley said of the 25-year-old Brumbies forward. "In other words, he doesn't crave the limelight. He craves the work and does his work well.

"The work [coach] Laurie Fisher did with him and the Brumbies pack this year has been very good for us, bringing him through. But more than anyone, the credit goes to him.

"He has worked incredibly hard. I have never seen a tougher critic on himself. Whenever Shep has a performance which I think is another step forward, he can see the bad side of it. That is why he has been able to get better.

"That attitude has probably been infectious for the whole front-row and scrum."

The All Blacks taught the Wallabies scrum a lesson. The Kiwi pack was as cunning and intelligent as it was strong, particularly with their ability to wheel the scrum. However, that experience has not dented the self-belief of the Wallabies pack that they will be better for it come the World Cup.

"We weren't under any false illusions about the All Blacks pack," Shepherdson said. "They are rated as the No.1 scrummaging pack in the world and I think that is definitely the case.

"They were a huge challenge for us. We were under pressure the whole game … we were behind the eight ball."

Tomorrow night, the Wallabies forwards will face a South African pack that will bear little - if any - resemblance to the pack they took on at Cape Town. The only survivors to make the trip to Sydney are loose-head prop CJ van der Linde, hooker Gary Botha and second-rower Johann Muller - but they are all likely to start off the bench.

Shepherdson believes that along with the South African pack's strength and scrummaging ability, their unpredictability will also be a danger. "It makes things difficult in previewing and reviewing them as they haven't played together," he said. "To underestimate them would be a pretty stupid thing to do."

Foley predicted a torrid battle. "We are expecting as hard a game as what we got out of the Kiwis, and very much as we got out of the other Springbok pack when we played them," he said.

"It's no good calling the other pack the No.1 pack. If these two packs went at it there wouldn't be a lot left of either one of them."

On paper, the strongest pack the Springboks could field at Telstra Stadium boast a total of 130 Test caps: van Linde (37), Botha (7), and Jannie Du Plessis (debutant) in the front-row; Johan Ackermann (12) and Muller (14) in the second-row; and Wikus van Heerden (5), Pedri Wannenburg (18) and Bob Skinstad (37) as the loose forwards.