Unlucky: Geoff Parling
England second-row Geoff Parling has described South Africa's match-winning try at Twickenham on Saturday as the "luckiest in history."
South Africa produced the game's only try after a box kick from Ben Youngs ricocheted back towards the England try-line off JP Pietersen, with Tom Wood fumbling the loose ball forwards and Willem Alberts pouncing to score.
The try gave South Africa a crucial ten-point lead going into half-time, forcing England to claw their way back into the match and fall narrowly short of victory.
"It was probably the flukiest try I have ever seen in the history of rugby," said to Parling to The Leicester Mercury.
"It came at a crucial stage of the game. We fought back well, got into the game and finished on top.
"At the whistle, we were not very far away - but we cannot keep saying that. I am gutted. We feel like it's another game that we should have won.
"We were not clinical enough at certain times but we did some things really well. Our breakdown, our defence and our scrum were good.
"They didn't want to scrum against us, they just wanted to mess about.
"They don't attack much either, they play field position and then come at you. We felt we defended really well against them and their so-called 'big runners' kept getting knocked back.
"There is this fallacy about South Africa having this super-human pack - but they are just blokes. Good blokes - but they are just blokes.
"We want to be known as that big, damaging pack. But we have to start winning games."
Comments
artherfish says...
Thats a bold comment. rather than yet another slanging match about the relative merits or lack of, Of English and Saffa rugby how about siugestions of other great flucky tries from history. They still count after all
Posted 10:33 26th November 2012
ManWarrior says...
Paling, I can read your pain bud...suck it up though, there are many for defeats against the Springboks coming. Oh, regarding the scrum, you're absolutely right in saying we were scared to scrum. Wouldn't you be if you got penalised every time the opposition scrummed in? It was a good test and we can take nothing away from England however, this referee has never sat well with South Africa and clearly had us "jittery". I think the score was a acceptable reflection of how both teams played even with our "lucky" trie. Go Bokke!
Posted 09:55 26th November 2012
Timofporirua says...
It wasn't the flukiest try, it was no try. The ball came forward from from JP Pietersen, Alberts who was in front of Pietersen made no attempt to retire but went forward to play the ball, and thus should have been penalised for being offside. And what about England getting an advantage from the knockon immediately preceding this?
England hardly deserved to win, but they didn't deserve to lose to a non-try.
Posted 09:39 26th November 2012
Centre12 says...
No excuses Geoff, in years to come the record books won't have any mention of a lucky try, you have only got yourselves to blame, sort it out before the 6N's.
Posted 09:39 26th November 2012
meneer says...
So true and we got even luckier with Robshaws decision in the dying minutes and of course it is lucky that England seem incapable of scoring any tries themselves (lucky or not). Perhaps we could look at the lucky penalties England were awarded even though the scrum was boring in. Anyway boring myself at the minute - poor rugby by both teams. We will need a lot more luck than that to beat the All Blacks.
Posted 09:31 26th November 2012
BokAvenger says...
What a clown. "They didn't want to scrum against us. They wanted to mess around." Go look at the footage Parling you moron. We didn't want to scrum because that idiot ref Owens allowed Corbisiero to scrum inwards all day.
Posted 09:23 26th November 2012
willem says...
In the word's of the great SA golfer Gary Player: "The more you practice, the luckier you get". Enough said.
Posted 09:16 26th November 2012
Chopper says...
...big runners kept on getting knocked back - um, when did this happen? Especially since the Boks didn't attack much?
With the majority of possession England never looked like scoring. ABs by at least 20 this Saturday.
Guys like Parling need to do their talking on the field and not carry on about how great they were afterwards.
Posted 09:10 26th November 2012
rugbyphile says...
The reason SA ddin't want to scrum in the first half was the unbeliavably bad reffing from Owens who penalised SA when Corbs lost his bind, penalised SA when Corbs bored inwards and pulled down the scrum --all rightly noted by the English commentators--full credit to them.
I assume Owens was paid his full match fee even though his first half was appalling---is that professional refereeing?
Posted 09:09 26th November 2012