Rassie: Boks should have taken chances, but All Blacks were the better side
· Citizen
Coach Rassie Erasmus said the Springboks failed to take their opportunities in their 33-16 defeat to the All Blacks, including when three points were on offer regularly, but acknowledged that the All Blacks were the better side overall and deserved to win.
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Saturday’s result at Ellis Park ended the Springboks’ 12-Test winning streak. It also allowed the All Blacks to overtake them at the top of the World Rugby rankings.
‘We were really dominating…’
The Springboks lost five tries to one, in a game that was close for a long time (score 13-12 to the Springboks at half-time) before all their errors compounded, while everything seemed to click for the visitors.
South Africa had a try by Malcolm Marx disallowed for a knock-on, another by Sacha Feinberg-Mngeomezulu held up, and opted for lineouts and scrums in positions where they could have kicked at posts.
Erasmus referred to one scrum when the All Blacks led 19-16 in the second half and the Springboks won penalty after penalty right in front of the posts, before Gerhard Steenekamp was penalised for walking around the scrum, allowing New Zealand to escape.
“I think it was the right call by the referee,” the Springbok coach said.
“Maybe the instructions, or suggestions, from the top should have been to take the three points. Without a doubt they scrummed really well there and from then on the momentum shifted.
“I thought up until minute 50 we were really dominating territory and possession and felt we were in the game. But a class team like New Zealand, if you don’t convert, they’ll give you a proper hiding.”
All Blacks were more accurate than Springboks
Erasmus added that in hindsight it was easy to say they should have taken straightforward penalty kicks.
But the Springboks had momentum from their scrums, especially by Ox Nché and Wilco Louw before they were replaced by Steenekamp and Zach Porthen.
The missed chances were not only the fault of the Springboks. They were forced by the All Blacks.
“There were two or three big moments where we just let the game go away from us. Not because we wanted to make those errors but because New Zealand forced those errors onto us by being really intense and sharp.
“They had a clever tactic that is 100% legal; they were stripping in the tackle.
“They weren’t tackling like we practised, like we thought they would. Normally they either push down or chop tackles. Even in the non-try, the ball was stripped right over the try line.
“The ball wasn’t slippery, we can’t use that as an excuse. We are not an inexperienced team. It’s probably the pressure that they put on us in the loose play and breakdowns, and so on. We didn’t do well there and they did great.”