Genius Rassie Erasmus interview resurfaces after Owen Farrell red is rescinded
You know something seriously bad has happened when people are using Rassie Erasmus interviews to take the moral high ground.
But before Erasmus became a video camera and water bottle wielding menace, he was slightly more subtle with the way he conducted himself. This was shown in 2018 after one of Owen Farrell’s infamous high tackles on South Africa’s Andre Esterhuizen, which he completely got away with. After that match, a training ground video of the Springboks found its way online showing Erasmus teaching his players to replicate Farrell’s tackle. But before that video there was the post match interview.
This interview has resurfaced after Farrell found himself in hot water yet again this week following a tackle on Wales’ Taine Basham. The key difference here is that Farrell was red carded during the match, but an independent panel overturned the red card on Tuesday, suggesting there were mitigating factors that led to the high tackle. The fallout from that decision has been gigantic, with fans, players and pundits almost universally decrying the decision.
As a result, Erasmus’ tongue-in-cheek response to the Farrell tackle in 2018 has been shared again.
“Shoulder charge or tackle?” Erasmus joked. “If it was a shoulder charge, the referee would have penalised him when we had a chance to win the game. It was a good tackle, well done, because I haven’t seen Andre Esterhuizen be tackled back like that in a while. If it was all legal, which I didn’t have a good look at on the replay, then we should start tackling like that. It’s obviously something that’s really effective, and if that’s allowed we should look into it and execute it like that.
Take a look:
Johan Rassie Erasmus shared his views a while back about Owen Farrell’s tackling, I mean shoulder charge.
“We should all be tackling like that, if it’s legal.” #OwenFarrell pic.twitter.com/WOG7NVXgBm
— RHABULA ☕️🐻 | Rugby World Cup 2023 (@Rugby_Scoop) August 16, 2023
Farrell is available to start for England this Saturday against Ireland at the Aviva Stadium in their penultimate World Cup warm-up Test.
