Cape Town - Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber says he doesn't know why the Boks started so slowly in their 25-17 Rugby Championship defeat to the Wallabies in Adelaide.
The hosts had the perfect start as they scored a try early on and also dominated the territory and possession numbers in the first quarter.
The South Africans got just three points in the opening 40 and went into the break trailing 10-3.
Replacement forward Kwagga Smith grabbed two late converted tries, but it proved nothing more than consolation for the Boks, who have now lost three in a row against the Wallabies.
When asked why they started so poorly, Nienaber said: "I can’t put my finger on that. I don’t think you can control a good start. They started the game, we expected the ball to come down the middle and they won the turnover, put pressure on us and they scored.
"You can’t plan for a good start, but you can plan to bring intensity. I don’t know why that happened, to be honest.”
The Boks did create opportunities, but they failed to convert those chances into points.
What was especially frustrating was how they couldn't even capitalise on their numerical advantage when Tom Wright was yellow-carded in the first half.
To that issue, Nienaber again had no answers.
“To be honest, we will have to have a look at it. I am not sure,” Nienaber said on why the Springboks could not capitalise while the Wallabies were one man down.
“There were maybe a bit of naive tactics from our side. Last week, when New Zealand went down to 14 men I thought we were a little bit naive in terms of how we as the coaches handled it, closing out those last seven minutes. We could have kept the ball in hand a little bit more.
“I thought we as the coaches could have been more clinical and clear with messages coming from on top. When we went down to 14, they put us under pressure, but when they were 14 men, we struggled to put the ball into the space where that winger would have been.”
The Boks next face Australia at Allianz Stadium on Saturday.
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