Ex-All Blacks captain reveals Springboks’ ‘only difference’ and how it helped them to win second Greatest Rivalry Test
Ex-New Zealand skipper Taine Randell (inset) and Malcolm Marx in action against the All Blacks.
Former All Blacks captain Taine Randell believes a much improved “psychological” approach from the Springboks helped them to win in Cape Town on Saturday.
After suffering a somewhat surprising 33-16 defeat against New Zealand in the opening Test of Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series at Ellis Park in Johannesburg on August 22, South Africa bounced back with an impressive performance at the DHL Stadium seven days later and clinched a 33-26 victory.
That means there will be plenty at stake when the Boks and All Blacks meet again at the FNB Stadium in Soweto this Saturday for their third clash before the arch-rivals face off at the M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, USA in the final Test on September 12.
Randell, who represented the All Blacks as a back-row in 51 Tests from 1997 to 2001, believes there is something psychological about suffering defeats in these type of contests, and highlighted how winning and losing affects the way players approach their next match.
“It is all psychological. These players on both teams, they’re all fully professional, have been their whole lives, most of them, from school onwards, they’re fully professional,” he told The Platform NZ podcast.
‘They talk about the top two inches’
“They can’t really get that much better physically. It’s all psychological. I think when you are at the top end of sport, they talk about the top two inches, it is so much that.
“Unless one team’s so clearly better physically than the other talent-wise, you can win two in a row. When two teams are pretty evenly matched with a lot of pressure, the difference in motivation, enthusiasm, and it’s only a small amount that counts for a bit.”
Randell believes the Springboks’ improved mental approach during their second Test was a major factor in helping them to draw level in Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series.
Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for world-class coverage you can trust.
“When I look at the game on the weekend, when you do, it was going to be a massive bounce back by the South Africans,” he said.
‘They were really physical in their first game’
“It wasn’t going to be physical because they were really physical in their first game, but it was all psychological.
“And for me, in a way, the game was almost, the two games were quite similar, except that the Springboks didn’t make the mistakes in Cape Town, just little mistakes that they did in Ellis Park, and they kicked their goals. That was the only difference between the two games.
“If in Ellis Park, they hadn’t made a couple of really silly, just silly basic mistakes, which I think was mental, they were pretty pumped up, they were overconfident.
“They made a couple of little mistakes, which are so crucial. When it came to Cape Town, they were siege mentality, and that’s why they did not make those mistakes, and they won the game.”