News

Boks pay the price for victory

August 09 2008

South Africa coach Peter de Villiers admitted his side may have paid a high price for their impressive 63-9 Mandela Challenge victory over Argentina in Johannesburg on Saturday.

The Springboks won handsomely in the end, scoring nine tries, but ended up losing lock Bakkies Botha to a knee injury and replacement midfielder Jaque Fourie to a possible cracked cheekbone ahead of their toughest clash of the season against New Zealand next Saturday when the Tri-Nations resumes.

Both players were taken to hospital for scans to determine the damage sustained, and De Villiers said he will have to put players on stand-by for the game next weekend which could go a long way to determining the Tri-Nations champions.

The Bok coach said he was hoping to keep the same 22 players, meaning that utility backs and World Cup-winners Frans Steyn and Ruan Pienaar may spend another weekend in the wilderness after being dropped from the squad this week and sent back to Currie Cup duty with their provinces.

"I have told these 22 players that they will be involved next weekend and I would like to keep it that way," De Villiers said.

"There is no doubt in their minds about whether they will be playing or not and that is positive for this squad. However if injuries mean we have to bring new players in, well, that is something that is beyond our control and we will have to handle that as it arises."

The Bok coach promised to clarify the situation on any new replacements by Sunday but confirmed that Bryan Habana, the IRB Player of the Year, would return to the squad alongside flanker Schalk Burger.

Both players were rested as a precaution after returning from niggling injuries sustained earlier in the Tri-Nations campaign.

Aside from the injuries, De Villiers was satisfed with Saturday's result.

"I was happy with the win and if you say but for the first 30 minutes [where the Boks trailed 9-0] then we must realise that life is not perfect and that these things happen. We were happy with the result and that is that," De Villiers said.

Captain Victor Matfield added that the freedom given to the players was perhaps a bit overstated in the first half, and that contributed to their poor first half hour.

"We went out with the mindset to play some rugby and we perhaps made a few to many 50-50 passes and got some turnovers against us for that," he said.

"But you must remember we were playing against a side who are in the top four in the world and who made the semi-finals of the Rugby World Cup last year.

"But from then on things seemed to stick and everything went well for us as we found our finishing touch.

"We needed something special and it came when Jean de Villiers broke through for the first time for Adi [Adrian Jacobs] try. We always knew we would have opportunities and we just needed to use them."