Erasmus: 'We must play much better than this'
REACTION: Rassie Erasmus gave his verdict on the Springboks’ performance following their 66-7 demolition job against Italy at Allianz Stadium in Turin on Saturday.
The Boks played almost a perfect first half, outscoring Italy 45-0 heading into the break.
The World Champions seemed on course to put the hammer down during the second half, but Italy held their own, although they still lost the second stanza 7-21 to the visitors.
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But for Erasmus, it’s not a red flag, and he credited the Italians for the fight they showed in the second half.
“It’s almost impossible to put 80 minutes at 100 percent together. I can’t say we were not happy with the second half [performance],” Erasmus told Rugby365.
“We were 45-0 up at halftime, and we managed to score 21 points in the second half.
“We don’t think Italy is a bad team; they’re a proud side, and they started running the ball from everywhere during the second half because they were down by 45 points.
“We also made some changes which we wanted to see. We lost a bit of rhythm, but we can’t fault the guys if you win 66-7 – you can’t start nitpicking problems because of the second-half performance.
“Obviously it wasn’t a perfect performance during the second stanza, but I think it was proper.”
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The Bok coach wasn’t surprised by his team’s performance after only assembling for their first training session on Monday since their defeat to Australia just over a month ago.
He credited the Springbok system for the team’s synergy but conceded they’ll need to improve their game in the next two weeks.
“The biggest thing is that the majority of this group has been together for eight years, and when we bring players into the system like Ethan Hooker, Krappie [Morne van den Berg], Sacha [Feinberg-Mngomezulu], who hasn’t been with us since 2018 [it becomes a seamless process], the nice thing is we’ve tried to ease players into the system.
“And when you go into a game like this, and you select a team that you know is match fit, ready, and everyone is calm and understands the system and has been in it for a while, that is quite satisfying.
“I know we must play much better than this if we want to be competitive against France and Ireland to put us in a position for the Nations Championship Final.
“It’s nice to know that after being a month away from each other, the boys just got together and clicked like that; that is satisfying.”
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Erasmus highlighted that despite the polished performance, the Boks are still missing key figures and stated that he selected his strongest possible side for this clash following the defeat to the Wallabies.
“We’re missing several experienced players such as RG Snyman, Eben Etzebeth, Kwagga Smith, Handre Pollard and the list goes on.
“I wouldn’t say this is definitely our best team, although I do feel this is the best team that was match fit, and some of the Japanese-based players, which is around eight players, had three to four weeks off.
“And most of the other guys got some good game time in the United Rugby Championship.
“I mean, we lost our previous game [to Australia]; we shouldn’t forget that, so we had to get back on the horse.
“I personally think Italy is a good team; we’ve never found it easy to play against them, especially when we play away from home.
“There are a few unavailable players who will definitely still contribute to the team.
“We rolled the dice against Australia by selecting guys who didn’t have a lot of game time and weren’t in sync, so we just wanted to get back on the horse and win the game.”
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