Boks let themselves down

Springbok captain Jean de Villiers believes that the players should shoulder all of the blame for their defeat to the All Blacks.

The experienced centre was brutally honest after his team's first defeat in then matches at Eden Park in Auckland, and admitted that they have some way to go before they can challenge the All Blacks as the best team in the world.

"We need to take a hard look at ourselves and the way that we performed because that was certainly not a performance that was good enough to compete with them.

"We will take this one on the chin, we are still quite some way from competing with the best but hopefully we learn from this game," he said.

De Villiers said that while being reduced to 14 men for most of the match had made it an even bigger challenge, his team's biggest problem was their inability to execute their gameplan.

"I thought we had prepared very well and we had the right gameplan, but this performance was 100% the fault of the players," he said.

However, his side will have a chance to redeem themselves when they host Australia and New Zealand in their final two matche of the competition.

"It is very disappointing and I feel we let our country down but the beauty is that we have got two games left to rectify that," said De Villiers.

Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer said that although there are many areas to work on, there were some positives his team can take from the performance as they continue to learn some valuable lessons.

"Even in the previous game when we played well there were things that we were not happy with. I really belive that we are improving, any side will take 50 against the All Blacks with 14 men at Eden Park.

"We are on a learning curve and there are two home games left and we have to regroup," he said.