With Brown confirmed to be heading home after the 2025 World Cup, Planet Rugby has mapped out the realistic candidate pool Erasmus is likely working through. The piece runs the ruler over eight names: Franco Smith (the personal history and shared coaching DNA make him appealing, but his own head-coaching ambitions and Glasgow contract complicate things), Nick Evans (freshly available after leaving Harlequins, with Flannery potentially acting as the bridge), and AB Zondagh (Top 14 pedigree with Toulouse plus international experience with Scotland). Mike Catt's recent Waratahs exit puts him in the frame given his Ireland and England CV, while the piece floats the intriguing possibility of Nienaber returning — not as a like-for-like Brown replacement but in a reshuffled backroom that could also shift Felix Jones toward a more specialist backs role. Among the internal options, Mzwandile Stick and Kevin Foote are both considered, though pulling Foote from the Junior Boks pipeline carries its own cost. The broader argument is that Erasmus has genuine depth of choice but faces a familiar tension: foreign coaches have consistently been preferred over local talent, and the most attractive external candidates will likely have competing offers.