Springboks and Wallabies - desperate battle of the wooden spoon

15 Frans Steyn, 14 JP Pietersen, 13 Jaque Fourie, 12 Jean de Villiers, 11 Bryan Habana, 10 Morné Steyn, 9 Francois Hougaard, 8 Pierre Spies, 7 Juan Smith, 6 Schalk Burger, 5 Victor Matfield, 4 Flip van der Merwe, 3 Jannie du Plessis, 2 John Smit (capt), 1 Gurthrö Steenkamp. Reserves: 16 Chiliboy Ralepelle, 17 CJ van der Linde, 18 Danie Rossouw, 19 Ryan Kankowski, 20 Ricky Januarie, 21 Butch James, 22 Juan de Jongh.

This is the Bok teams for the Test against the Wallabies. It’s going to be a pretty desperate match as the Boks try and hand the wooden spoon currently in their grasp back to the Australians. South Africa can’t buy a win at the moment (hey that’s an idea, get the refs agent on the phone. He doesn’t have an agent?) and there will be 15 massively frustrated massive men on the field on this Saturday. Are the Boks going to be able to pick themselves up after the gut wrenching loss last weekend? Will Victor Matfield be the victor on his hundredth cap? And will Francois Hougaard get rid of that awful mullet he’s sporting? These are all deep, difficult questions to answer. And it’s safe to say that Hougaards hair will remain untouched for another week.

For me, I think it’s important to look at each coaches tactics for the weekend. Not for the game, but for the post match excuses if they lose. Deans is likely to run with his tried and tested ‘We’re building for the World Cup’. It’s served him well in the past, but the opposition (the press) have this one sussed now so he may have to come up something more creative. If I was him, I’d blame Cooper. That little upstart probably has all the Aussies feeling like they are hard down by with their salaries now. They may go on strike before the match.

De Villiers is a bit harder to predict, he could literally say anything. ‘Conspiracy’ was his initial gambit, followed by a bit of self deprecating( but spot on) humour by calling himself a clown. This is from 2008 “The same people who threw their robes on the ground when Jesus rode on a donkey were the same people who crowned him and hit him with sticks and stuff like that, and were the same people who said afterwards how we shouldn't have done that, he's the son of God," de Villiers said. "So that's exactly what we do. You have to look at history is repeating itself, and I'm not saying that I'm God."

I have to bow down to the master and admit he will come out with something better than I ever will.

So who’s going to win? For the Boks Frans Steyn and Jaque Fourie make their returns after suspensions and French adventures have been overcome, adding a bit of welcome class and experience to the side. South Africa looked much better last weekend – it would be good to see them run with the ball, but at this stage as a supporter of the Bokke I would take any kind of win they could deliver, big small, boring, just don’t lose this one.

The Wallabies will have money man game breaker Cooper back, they are one up over the Boks, and are one smart team – how they manage to compete at this level with their player resources is a mystery. They also looked pretty decent against the AB’s in the last match.

But as I’m hoping somewhat against my better judgment that the Boks turned a corner last weekend  and I’m going with them for a 5 point win.