Make no mistake, despite the Springboks winning the series against the British and Irish Lions, this current side is going backwards, says iafrica.com?s Rob Peters.

I am among the first to applaud the Springboks for their series victory over the British and Irish Lions. It was an admirable and deserved accomplishment, but despite the triumph it appears that this side is regressing at an alarming rate ? and you can thank the coaching staff for that.

Under the trio of Peter de Villiers, Dick Muir and Gary Gold, the Springboks have been successful ? to a point ? in the results column, but the team has not pushed on since winning the World Cup in 2007 as they should have.

The Boks of 2008 were favoured to win the Tri-Nations title, and justifiably so considering they were up against a rebuilding Australia and New Zealand, yet despite fielding the most experienced (and arguably talented) side in the competition, the South Africans finished dead last.

De Villiers, who had already shown a penchant for bizarre statements in the media, survived the worst of it after a historic win over the All Blacks in Dunedin, and a demolition of the Wallabies in Joburg in the final game of the '08 tournament. But sandwiched between those two performances were a 19-0 loss to the ABs and a 27-15 defeat to the Wallabies ? the latter being the first time the Australians had won in South Africa in eight years.

But fans tend to remember the last game and the victory over the Aussies at Ellis Park gave them hope.

The Boks then achieved a clean sweep on a three-match tour of the United Kingdom and De Villiers ? along with his assistants ? were again the toast of the town. But on closer inspection, the results were far from ideal. A narrow 20-15 win over Wales, followed by a 14-10 victory over a weak Scotland, did not make for ideal reading. But again the Boks finished on a high ? this time with a record 42-6 win over the English? Div and co dodged yet another bullet.

But these inconsistencies should be seen as a major concern. And they have continued this season against the Lions.

The fact remains that a team of the Springboks? current quality should not be squeaking by the opposition, they should be riding the crest of a wave that began to peak at the end of 2007. This should not be seen as arrogance, it is a reality of where the top sides in the world currently sit in regards to their development.

The Australians and Kiwis continue to re-build ? courtesy of injuries, retirements and player movement abroad. The northern hemisphere teams are going through a rut. And the likes of Argentina, Samoa and Fiji simply do not have the financial power to compete.

Of all the top nations in rugby, South Africa is the most stable. They have a squad boasting heaps of experience, a mass of young talent, and in John Smit they have arguably the most-respected captain in world rugby. They should be building on their World Cup heroics, breaking records, winning Tri-Nations titles and clinching a whitewash over the Lions by winning a 'dead-rubber'.

Unfortunately, they have not managed to do so. Instead they have continued to travel on a rollercoaster of results, unable to capitalise on the groundwork done before the current management team took over ? and in my mind much of the fault lies with them.

They have shown time and again that tactically they are at sixes and sevens. Selections, at times, have been boggling, while we all remember those substitutions in Durban.

We managed to secure the series in Pretoria, but that comes down to the players, not the coaching staff. Experience won the day in the first two Tests, but with a first-ever whitewash on the cards, the management again fluffed their selections by choosing to experiment instead of pushing on.

I said before the final Test that De Villiers was making a mistake by ringing the changes. What he hoped to learn I will never know, but beyond the realisation that throwing players into a heated Test environment after a long period of inactivity is bad, I can?t believe that he learnt anything new.

It was arrogant to believe we could field a second-string unit against the Lions in Johannesburg, and you can be sure the selections for the third Test only served to fire up the tourists further. A number of the players picked for the final Test will not be considered 'second-string' by many ? including me ? but they certainly are for De Villiers. If they weren?t they would have played in the first two Tests?

Wynand Olivier, who was the form centre in South Africa during the Super 14, had not played a game since the Super 14 Final, while the last time Jongi Nokwe and Odwa Ndugane played a match of any real intensity was close to two months ago! They were never going to be prepared for the rigours of Test match rugby after such a long lay-off. And it showed on Saturday.

It is not just the results that worry me, but also the frustration beginning to show amongst the players. There has been plenty of niggle in this series, but the Boks? discipline in Johannesburg was appalling, and it had me thinking back to the latter part of the Rudolf Straueli era, which is certainly not a good thing.

De Villiers is a lot like Straueli. His attitude towards the media is one of mistrust and antagonism. And we have all become accustomed to his strange rants, littered with garbled parables and biblical references. He also seems to think everybody is out to get him ? a mainstay of most Springbok coaches unfortunately.

It seems to be seeping into the team morale now and that is a dangerous thing. Smit cannot hold this team together forever and they are beginning to show very real signs of cracking. I only hope that I am wrong, but I see another disappointing Tri-Nations ahead?

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