Nick Mallett: Two areas where the Springboks were ‘poor’ which Rassie Erasmus can normally bank on
Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii and an inset of ex-Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus.
The Wallabies nullified two of the Springboks’ strengths en route to claiming a 42-38 victory in Perth, according to Nick Mallett.
South Africa’s scrum and aerial prowess have been cornerstones of Rassie Erasmus’ team over the past few years and that was the case during Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series against the All Blacks.
However, those were two areas of the game where Les Kiss’ side had some success against the Boks, with the men in Green and Gold not dominating the scrum as they have in recent times.
Where the Wallabies were better
Furthermore, the selection of Joseph-Aukuso Sua’ali’i on the wing meant that the Wallabies had a real threat under the high ball, with Max Jorgensen and Tom Wright impressing in the aerial game too.
Mallett says that the aerial game and scrum are usually strengths for the Springboks and facets that Erasmus can “bank on” but they were poor in these departments on Sunday.
“There were two areas of the game where we were poor. Firstly, we didn’t get scrum penalties with the scrummaging front-row that we started the game with, and we did discuss that before,” he said on the Talking Boks podcast.
“We thought that they might not dominate the Australian scrum. I thought Angus Bell handled their scrum really well. And secondly, their contestables were unusually better than ours. They were very, very good. Sua’ali’i deflecting one and Ikitau’s try came from one of those contestables.
“I thought [Ryan] Lonergan kicked beautifully, and Jorgensen was absolutely outstanding in the air as well. So, the two areas that we normally can bank on, two of our pillars, as I like to call it, they were very good.”
Wallabies v Springboks: Five takeaways as ‘simply magnificent’ star shines in Socceroo-style victory
Springboks didn’t play well enough to win
The former Springboks head coach argued that Australia’s 15-point advantage heading into the final quarter was well-deserved but they were let down in the latter stages of the game through their discipline.
“So, after 60 minutes, one couldn’t argue with that 42-17; there was one of those very frustrating Bok attacks where one poor pass went to ground behind Canan Moodie and Jorgensen picked it up and ran – that was almost a 14-point turnaround there,” he said.
“But then I thought that was the nail in the coffin; we’ve got to be careful now, so that it doesn’t go the way of that match at Ellis Park, where they just scored and scored against us.
“The more we tried, the more they managed to pick off our mistakes and score points. But the moment we got our scrum going, and it’s quite unusual- the moment we started getting scrum penalties, their discipline fell out the window. They were coming in with high tackles, high shots, in from the side, playing the scrum-half without the ball, offside, no-arm tackles, and I don’t think any of those yellow cards could be argued. In fact, possibly there could have been more.
“If you think that we got a penalty when Ethan Hooker tackled one of their players on the shoulder and just rode up to touch his chin. To get a penalty for that, I thought, was unusual, but they were getting clear head-on head contact and getting yellow cards, and they weren’t upgraded to red, which is fine, but they definitely deserved the yellow cards.
“That final 20 minutes was a very strange part of the game in that they were trying to play out time, and we were just begging to have another five minutes just to maybe finish them off because we came back very, very strongly at the end and we were all over them in the last 10 to 15 minutes, but it was mainly because they were down to 11 players.
Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for world-class coverage you can trust.
“Overall, they deserved the win. I felt we didn’t play well enough, particularly in the first 20 minutes of the second half, where our discipline wasn’t good. We gave away six or seven consecutive penalties and got ourselves really into a bad position, going from 17 to 20, 24 to 27, to 30, and then two tries, so the game was taken away from us in those 20 minutes.”
He added: “I do think that our lack of scrum penalties was a problem for us, and the contestable game wasn’t as good as it usually is. Those are the two key areas that came out of that game, where Australia really did well.”
