Powered by forward thinking

Johnny Waterson talks to the South Africa number eight who, at 24, is already being spoken about as a major player of his generation.

Picture a small herd of buffalo butting heads with a Land Rover. It might have been a scene from Kruger National Park, but in this cameo the buffalo are winning, skimming the scrum machine over the wet morning grass.

Two of the younger males, Schalk Burger and Joe van Niekerk, have licks of bleached mane falling around their faces, van Niekerk's tufting out from underneath a black scrum cap.

The third, AJ Venter is the seasoned old bull, possibly the hardest hitter in this South African back row, a rough-cut bruiser with a chequered disciplinary record and an appetite for the physical. Venter missed the beginning of this year's Test matches while serving out an eight-week suspension for an alleged head-butting incident.

Burger, son of the South African lock of the 1980s with the same name, after a yellow card in Cardiff is forging a reputation as a naturally powerful blindside flanker but skittish and prone to bull-charge offside and over the top.

Van Niekerk, at 24, is already being spoken about as a major player of his generation. A career so far blighted by groin injuries and most recently a knee problem, one that had him carried out of South Africa's World Cup run just before they met New Zealand in the quarter-final. It slowed down his rise but failed to halt it. At number eight he made his South African debut before even playing Currie Cup or Super 12 rugby. His dynamism around the pitch and his eye-catching mobility off the scrum were talents enough for him to be taken from his captain's role in the South African under-21s straight into the senior side.

Since then the profile has ballooned. At 1.92 metres and with a sprinter's build he's hard to ignore. During his recovery from the knee injury last winter, van Niekerk was photographed by a tabloid newspaper having a drink and with a cigarette in his hand. "Big Joe" the night owl was born. Truth is "Big Joe" is far from it and South Africa coach Jake White has already intimated that van Niekerk is one of the central players in his team. The back row admits to a little peroxide in his hair but he explains it away as a reflection of the new regime. Openness, transparency and expression in South African rugby.

"What's nice about this team is that you are allowed to say what you feel. In previous sides you might not have said what you believe and what you think. No one gets offended. You are allowed to have input. That's a great thing for me," he says.

"In general the coach allows for a lot more freedom of expression. Not just on the field but off it too. We're definitely a much happier bunch than we were a year ago. The era before this there was a lot of heartache and a lot of things done that weren't accepted and wouldn't be accepted now. Things have changed a lot since then."

In 2002 "Big Joe" was also a big hit with his playing colleagues. After a string of radiant performances in the Tri-Nations he was named South Africa's Player of the Year and one of the nominees for IRB Player of the Year. He now has 28 Tests under his belt and, although boyishly engaging, talks like a future captain rather than a player ready to party his career into the ground.

"I like to think my approach towards the game is pretty intense mentally," he says. "At this level you face guys who are all big, all strong physically and they're all quick. At the end of the day, I think it comes down to what you do up stairs, know how to touch up the grey matter and get that going in the right direction. Do that and you can go a long way.

"I know in the squad we've superb athletes in the back row, who can run, kick, pass, sprint. They're big guys. There is a lot of competition for loose forward positions in South African rugby but that can only be good for us. Every time you go out you have to put in your biggest effort, play like it's the biggest game of your life."

The challenge an Irish back row of Simon Easterby, Anthony Foley and Johnny O'Connor faces is a Springbok triumvirate selected for size and mobility. Venter's shock tackling is long established and in Burger they meet the outstanding newcomer to Super 12 and Tri-nations. At 21, he's a rough diamond but White, who coached him as a 19-year-old at under-21 level, knows his potential. This week the coach's protectionist instincts kicked in and Burger was declared off limits to the media.

"Rugby is one of those games where you can get targeted and he is one of those players who plays on the borderline," says White. "Any guy at openside flanker at Test level is always going to be having a go. He's slowing the ball down and maybe trying to win a turnover. But we're going to have a chat with him and he's going to have to realise that to become one of the best in the world, you've got to adapt. If he's going to be dumb and run around diving in head first then he's going to live by the consequences. We'll have to move (another player) to six and Schalk would have to go to 23."

White and van Niekerk will also have fathomed that if Wales could mark the number eight reasonably well last week, particularly coming off the scrum, so too will Eddie O'Sullivan have picked it up in the video analysis. As a result the ball carrier was forced across pitch more often than he would have liked and his gain was reduced.

"Yeah, I found myself under pressure from their flanker last week and found myself running a little sideways," says van Niekerk. "He knew I was doing a pick and go. I will have to vary it this week, maybe play Schalk inside, someone running off me. There are various options but definitely in Lansdowne Road we are going to have to do something around that. A variation will help."

By the end of the session, the three flankers grunt and pack into the collective heave, move forward, then break off and fizz away in different directions, their massive legs pumping as the machine continues forward, momentum courtesy of the front row and locks. Keeping their distance, the small gathering of Blackrock College schoolboys is consumed by the power and pace of the buffalo. Pensive animals, they are. But prone to unprovoked attack.