Herschel Jantjies’ agent must be the busiest man in South Africa at the moment.
What we saw on Saturday when the 23-year-old Capetonian came off the bench to score the Springboks’ only try and seal a 16-16 draw against the All Blacks, was something I definitely didn’t see coming.
After his dream debut against Australia at Ellis Park when he scored two tries, I thought it couldn’t get better than this.
In fact, I was convinced that it couldn’t.
And then he produced some Ricky Januarie magic in New Zealand.
For those who don’t remember, here is a bit of a recap.
It was 2008 and the then-world champion Springboks trailed New Zealand 23-28 in Dunedin.
There were five minutes left to play and scrumhalf Januarie sold a dummy close to the halfway line and broke the All Blacks line.
He then chip-kicked the last defender before collecting the ball to dot down for a match-winning try.
Ok, so the Springboks didn’t win this match, but Jantjies also gathered a kick to dive over for a try that I believe will be remembered much in the same way as that Januarie moment.
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/RugbyChampionship?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RugbyChampionship #TRC2019 #TryoftheWeek #NZLvRSA pic.twitter.com/RDqwsbXIBb
— Super Rugby/TRC (@SuperRugby)
In fact, having witnessed what Jantjies has done over the past two weeks, I believe he just signed himself to a long-term stint in the Green and Gold.
Back to his agent.
Not only will he be fielding phone calls from journalists the world over to chat to his client, not only does he have to get everything in order for his client to go to Japan for the World Cup, but I believe this is the perfect time to start negotiating contracts on behalf of his client.
There is currently no hotter property in world rugby at the moment.
And they say strike while the iron is hot.
It spells problems for 'Western Problems'.
Their financial difficulty has been well documented.
Now if you take into consideration that Jantjies was not a key player for the Stormers at the start of the season and when I say key, I mean he wasn’t an automatic starter, you can bet his contract will reflect that status.
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/bokrugby?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#bokrugby #springboks @Springboks can we try and emulate this again please? pic.twitter.com/TGnTvdWTyG
— Morne Lombard (@LoftusLombard)
Much has changed since then, though, and Jantjies is now undoubtedly one of the men we know will go to the World Cup.
There is simply no way Rassie Erasmus can leave out the youngster now.
Having played a single game for Scarlets in Wales in 2017, on loan from WP, it’s not only the teams in the southern hemisphere that will come calling.
We all know the biggest sharks will probably come from the north of South Africa where the Blue Bulls operate.
Luckily they’ve got Embrose Papier and Ivan van Zyl.
But Province will have to dig deep into their pockets if they want to secure this player in the long run.
Well, they and the South African Rugby Union.
I believe Jantjies is a passionate player and looks like the sort of guy who doesn’t necessarily want to play his rugby overseas.
So come on administrators, let’s give him a deal that reflects his current status. We can’t afford to let this scrumhalf slip through our fingers.