In the same way that a scabrous populism has swept through world politics (think the joker in the pink tie), so international sport has narrowed terribly. You support your team, your club, your guy.It’s always been like this, true, but there’s something different now. There’s a nasty edge to fandom. There’s too much reflexive referee or umpire-bashing, too much bile, and too much trash-talking.This surely has something to do with the reach of social media, which generally promotes opinions without accountability and then recycles those opinions back to you via an algorithm.Echo chambers are bad faith environments, and such environments have affected sport. There’s too much underbelly showing in fans’ support nowadays; too much rabid nationalism posturing as loyalty. It’s shameful.What happened — don’t laugh — to a beer after a match? A handshake that wasn’t an empty ritual for the cameras? Once, at the Estadio Jalisco in Guadalajara, Mexico, England’s Bobby Moore swapped shirts with Brazil’s Pelé after a 1970 World Cup group game.Moore was in red, while Pelé was in Brazil’s yellow, so it all looked kif in colour. By today’s standards, the two giants of the game sharing a human moment seems only a quaint gesture dating back to the game’s prehistory. The same two players now would already be preparing for their ice bath and a natter to their agent to curate their Instagram page. Something has been lost.I mention this because while I’m as crazy about the Boks as the next man, I also appreciate — or like to think so — members of the opposition. The All Blacks, for example, have a long tradition of eighthmen, going back via Kieran Read to Zinzan Brooke and “Buck” Shelford. Current skipper Ardie Savea slots in right there.Savea seems almost comical from a distance. His legs, neither muscular nor shapely, look held together with bandages. His movement on the pitch is busy, often made up of small steps rather than long strides, which reinforces the vaguely comic air.But don’t let appearances mislead you. Savea is a grizzled aristocrat. He’s hard, he’s deft, and his reading of the game is superb. We tend to associate him with the big moment (again, modern sport’s obsession with the glaringly obvious): the crowning try dotted down in the corner.But watch Savea tackle; watch him watch the ball. Watch him pilfer and disrupt; watch him listen to the ref with his head slightly tilted. His expression is worth considering. To me, it says, “Let’s get this empty ritual over so we can get on with it.” Without Savea to conduct the black orchestra, coach Dave Rennie would be half the man.And what of the Savea eye? The skipper’s eye is full of intelligence, full of his love for New Zealand and the game of rugby. You wonder how much more punishment the body can take, but you rather fancy that after Saturday’s Test in Soweto is concerned, Savea will be nursing his way to next year’s World Cup as the end of his long and distinguished road.I like the idea of giving credit where it’s due because once was the time when the biggest game in town was Transvaal playing Western Province at Newlands in their annual New Year cricket fixture. South Africa wasn’t playing international sport in the 1980s, so the best you could do was watch Clive Rice stomping back to his mark while gruffly rolling up his sleeve.Jimmy Cook fiddled with the top of his pad; Alan Kourie’s mannerisms were the strangest. Kourie seemed as incapable of showing emotion as he was of bending his front leg. His forward defence wasn’t a cricket shot; it was a cosmic refusal.I loved these guys. They provided a backdrop to the action of my life. I enjoyed the international sports people too: Ivan Lendl seemed to sweat only above his ears; Michael Lynagh was preternaturally neat. Paul Gascoigne was pure hysterical genius, a character from opera buffa. It was all we had. Which is why I have a soft spot for some of the sports people who grace these shores. Once was the time when they never came here.