Ox Nché and Wilco Louw are the Springboks twin scrum threat

If Ox Nché does not break the opposition at loosehead, Wilco Louw can break them at tighthead. There is no safe side at scrum time against the Springboks.

The duo were immense against the All Blacks at Ellis Park and the game turned against the Springboks after they were substituted.

Nché attacks the opposing tighthead. Louw attacks the loosehead. The pressure comes from both sides and the numbers confirm the destruction.

This is what makes the Springbok scrum so different. Most international front rows have a dominant side. South Africa have two.

The Springboks twin scrum threat

The Opta data has Louw as the most destructive Tier One prop when the opposition feeds the scrum. Those packs fail on 37 percent of their feeds when the Springbok tighthead is involved.

England loosehead Ellis Genge is next at 31.4 percent, followed by England tighthead Joe Heyes at 28.2 percent and Italy’s Simone Ferrari at 26.9 percent.

Opposition scrum failure rate

Louw’s advantage over Genge is 5.6 percentage points. At Test level, that is a chasm.

Since the 2023 World Cup, 23.6 percent of all scrums involving Louw have resulted in a penalty to South Africa. Among international props with a minimum of 50 scrum involvements, he ranks third.

Then there is Ox.

In one Rugby Championship campaign, Nché won 19 scrum penalties. That was eight more than any other player in the tournament.

In the United Rugby Championship, he recorded a 24 percent success rate on opposition feeds. Nearly one in every four opposition scrums became either a turnover or a penalty because of the pressure generated on his side.

Nché also topped the StatMaster URC Top 100 with an xP rating of 95.2. It was an algorithmic score built heavily on the value of his set-piece dominance.

The statistics are brutal, but the sight of Nché at work is even more emphatic.

At 1.76m and 123kg, his compact frame allows him to get underneath taller tightheads and force them into a contest fought at his height. His body position is low, his back is short and his power travels directly through the opposing prop.

The 2023 World Cup semifinal against England remains the defining example. Nché’s introduction transformed a Springbok scrum that had been under pressure into the weapon that changed the match. Consecutive scrum penalties shifted the momentum and gave South Africa the platform for their escape.

Louw does his damage differently.

Former Bulls coach Jake White described him as bringing “140kg of Afrikaner beef” to the pack, but Louw is more than size. He absorbs the initial pressure, holds his shape and then delivers the second shove. That is when opposition looseheads fold, stand up or concede.

One is compact and explosive. The other is massive and relentless.

Together, they remove the traditional escape route at scrum time. An opponent cannot load one side and hope to survive on the other because both props are under attack.

Nché is the loosehead destroyer and Louw is the tighthead wrecking ball.

The Springbok scrum does not have one point of impact. It has two, which currently is the point of difference and the reason why the Springboks scrum is the most dominant in Test rugby.