Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber has defended his team selection in the wake of their 35-23 defeat to the All Blacks at Ellis Park on Saturday.
South Africa trailed 15-0 in the first half and despite fighting their way back, an unnecessary high kick from scrumhalf Jaden Hendricks with the Springboks up 23-21 against 14 men with six minutes to play allowed New Zealand an opportunity to attack.
David Havili finished off the move, as the All Blacks added another late try to make it a groot score.
But the damage was done early on and Nienaber, with the men Nienaber brought in after last week’s win in Mbombela struggling.
Nienaber brought on a large part of his bench before the end of the first half, and was asked about his decision to play Joseph Dweba at hooker instead of last week’s Man of the Match Malcolm Marx.
Nienaber explains: “There’s always a reason [for the selection] - a rugby reason why we did that, but that’s privileged.”
🗣️ More reaction from the Bok camp after NZ defeat: "We had a few opportunities, and we didn’t capitalise on them" - more here: https://t.co/efATBSMAmu#StrongerTogether #StrongerForever #RSAvNZL #CastleRugbyChampionship pic.twitter.com/8bZlSV8LFS
— Springboks (@Springboks) August 14, 2022
The All Blacks admitted afterwards that they had targeted Dweba, who played in only his third Test.
Nienaber adds of his team’s overall performance: “We didn’t control the game in the first half and weren’t as accurate as we were last week.
“They kept on taking high risks and we didn’t contain that well. We did well to come back and I thought we got ourselves back in the game at the back-end of the first half. They took control again in the 73rd minute, but we did well to get back in the game.”
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The Springboks leave for Australia, where they’ll play two Tests with the first one on August 27, on Thursday.
dudley.carstens@inl.co.za