Bumbling Boks buried by masterful All Blacks

Published Oct 8, 2016

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Cape Town - It would’ve been painful to watch for Springbok supporters, but hopefully now coach Allister Coetzee will realise how far behind the All Blacks they are after being put to the sword by 57-15 in Durban on Saturday night.

The Boks were all bluster, but the inherent attacking mindset of the All Blacks was just too hot to handle as the Kiwis scored nine tries to nought to set a new record winning margin of 42 over the South Africans - surpassing the 52-16 win in 2003 - and underline their dominance and finish the Rugby Championship unbeaten after six matches.

The All Blacks have now equalled the world record of 17 consecutive Test wins by a tier-one nation, and will have a chance to set a new mark against Australia in Auckland on October 22.

But on Saturday, while the Boks showed good abrasiveness and were certainly “up” for the game, they were never going to beat New Zealand with just a brute pack of forwards and Morné Steyn. But that’s all that Allister Coetzee’s had in store, and they received a rugby lesson from Steve Hansen and his team.\

The Boks got stuck in and were in the faces of the All Blacks from the start, and it earned them two penalties that Steyn slotted for a 6-0 in the first quarter.

But after a number of early All Black attacks were thwarted by desperate Bok defence, the dam wall eventually broke when outstanding ball retention from the visitors resulted in Jerome Kaino producing a terrific offload from the ground to put Israel Dagg over in the corner.

Despite another Steyn penalty to stretch the Bok lead to 9-5, it wasn’t long before the Kiwis crossed the line again when scrumhalf TJ Perenara slipped through the Bok defence. He appeared to lose the ball just short of the line, but referee Jerome Garces and TMO John Lacey were happy that there wasn’t separation between the player and the ball.

Brodie Retallick was denied a try just before the break after Kieran Read detached from a maul, and when Steyn kicked another penalty, the Boks would’ve felt that they still had a chance of victory at 12-9 behind at halftime.

But Hansen must’ve had stern words with his champion players in the change room as they came out with serious intent after the break. New Zealand held on to the ball for over 20 phases in a heady mix of offloads, pick-and-go attempts, long passes, and bashing it up the middle before Barrett put Dagg over.

After that, the nightmare started for the Boks when fullback Pat Lambie had a chip from his 22 charged-down by the energetic centre Anton Lienert-Brown, and Barrett scored to put his team 22-12 ahead.

Steyn pulled back another three points, but that was the end of the Boks’ contribution. The lack of endeavour on attack came back to haunt the South Africans as they ran out of energy to make tackle after tackle, and New Zealand showed how the game of rugby should be played as they hit the gaps and made a number of incredible passes.

Lambie lost an up-and-under in the air, his opposite number Ben Smith won the ball, and a few moments later Perenara was over for his second try.

Another mistake by the Boks, with Lionel Mapoe knocking on a Damian de Allende offload, saw Barrett flying down the left flank to settle the result.

At 36-15 and 10 minutes left, the South Africans had lost their fire and passion, and that is when the Kiwis put their foot down as Codie Taylor, Ben Smith and Liam Squire buried the Boks further into the ground.

POINTS-SCORERS

Springboks- Penalties: Morné Steyn (5).

All Blacks- Tries: Israel Dagg (2), TJ Perenara (2), Beauden Barrett (2), Codie Taylor, Ben Smith, Liam Squire. Conversions: Barrett (3), Lima Sopoaga (3).

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