Boks' risky bench split: Why Nienaber may hold his nerve

The perils associated with the Springboks' current favouring of a 6-2 split between forwards and backs among the substitutes were starkly highlighted at Nelspruit on Saturday.

That the Boks nevertheless put the tottering All Blacks firmly to the sword in the Rugby Championship encounter - 26-10, their best post-isolation win margin against them - may only make mastermind Jacques Nienaber determined to follow the same policy course in the swift follow-up encounter against the same foes at Ellis Park.

The head coach is entitled to reason, after all, that it doesn't happen every day that you lose a key figure like a scrumhalf (in this case Faf de Klerk) to a head injury within the opening minute of a Test ... suddenly leaving your remaining back-division bench options still on the splinters at a dangerously miserly one.

Mbombela Stadium has a strange habit, in its relatively modest international history, of causing injury-related angst to the home cause very early on: Arno Botha was a fourth-minute departure against Scotland there in 2013.

But now the action switches to the intimidating Johannesburg venue, where the chipper-feeling Boks will feel lightning on that front shouldn't strike twice.

It is also a particularly tantalising chance to twist the knife on the old enemy as the battleground moves from the roughly 680m altitude of Nelspruit to altogether more lung-busting 1 750m of the "Big Smoke".

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Thanks to Jaden Hendrikse's hugely assured slot-in, following the more seasoned De Klerk's misfortune, the World Cup-holders barely felt any disruption in the pivotal position ... it is also history now that they only felt the need to infuse the second backline replacement,