Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus was not overly pleased by South Africa’s performance against Scotland on Sunday in the Autumn Nations Series.
Two Makazole Mapimpi tries and further scores from Thomas du Toit and Jasper Wiese saw the Springboks to a 32-15 win over Scotland at Murrayfield, however, the Bok boss was notably annoyed by his side’s overall performance.
Erasmus admitted that the scoreline flattered his side after South Africa made 11 changes to their starting XV from the one that beat Argentina to seal the Rugby Championship in September.
While he was pleased that they managed to keep Scotland try-less for a second Test match in a row – a tough task according to the Boks head coach with a player like Finn Russell at fly-half – Erasmus was far from happy with the manner in which South Africa claimed their first win this November.
Erasmus frustrated by Springboks’ performance
The Springboks raced into a 5-0 lead after a deft cross kick from Handre Pollard landed perfectly for Mapimpi to open the scoring and momentum looked to have shifted in South Africa’s favour when Scotland lock Scott Cummings was sent to the sin bin five minutes later for a croc roll on Franco Mostert.
Cummings’ yellow was upgraded to a 20-minute red card by the foul play review officer which game the Boks a one-man advantage for much of the first half but the world champions failed to capitalise.
During the period that Scotland were down to 14-men, fly-half Russell converted two penalties with South Africa failing to score a point, losing that period of the match 6-0 which was hugely frustrating for Erasmus.
“I don’t want to comment on those cards because sometimes it’s so tough, it’s an accident, luckily it was not a red, red card that they are down to 14 for the whole match,” Erasmus said when asked about the red card to Cummings.
“We got a yellow card when they didn’t score a try but actually when they had that red card we didn’t score a point, they scored more points in that time that was really frustrating.
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“When they were 14 men and we were 15 and we couldn’t score that frustrated me a bit but sometimes I think it’s just bad luck, I don’t think any player goes out there and does that kind of thing on purpose.”
Erasmus was not willing to offer an opinion on the merit of the red card for the Scotland forward but did say that any red card is frustrating for a team and a player.
“I wouldn’t want to be connected to a headline like that, any red card is frustrating if a player did it by accident or did it on purpose which seldom happens,” he said.
“Sometimes it’s just an accident, so I would feel frustrated.”
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Townsend proud of Scotland’s defence and lauds Springboks scrum
Meanwhile, Scotland boss Gregor Townsend was willing to share his view as he felt the decision was “very harsh” and there was “massive mitigating” factors.
He felt that it was his team’s best performance in recent seasons and agreed that the scoreline did not reflect the match.
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He was particularly impressed by his team’s defence and lauded the Springboks’ scrum which took the game away from the hosts in the second half.
“I think the way we defended throughout the game was at the highest level, we produced,” Townsend said.
“We had moments when they emptied the bench when we were in own 22 and we were getting turnovers and there were great elements of defence and then the game opened up there was counter-attack opportunities there were turnover attacks and that really suited our strengths.
“We were getting linebreaks in behind so yes, I did feel it was going our way but we needed to get to at least 22-all to make it go into the last 10 minutes and see how that would turn out. When we didn’t get those seven points, they were just one penalty away from taking three points.
“They got penalties from their scrum, we can’t deny that, their scrum was very impressive and it just kept them ahead.”
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