South Africa have been left counting the cost of a bruising loss to Australia in their Tri-Nations Test at the Subiaco Oval in Perth.
Unable to produce a try, the Springboks suffered a surprise 16-9 defeat at the hands of the Wallabies and emerged from the clash with fresh injury worries over star flanker Schalk Burger (neck) and speedy winger Bryan Habana (shoulder).
The Boks went into Saturday night’s match without captain John Smit, whose Tri-Nations is over after groin surgery, and outside centre Adrian Jacobs (hamstring), and there were plenty of sore bodies on their bench by the final hooter.
Of the most concern were Burger, who left the field early in the second half, and Habana, who hurt his left shoulder as he attempted to dive across the line for a try late in the game.
Springbok coach Peter de Villiers said the pair would be assessed over the next few days, but the South Africans do have the luxury of almost a month to prepare for their next Tri-Nations match.
”We made two injury replacements,” he said.
”Schalk has a neck injury at the moment and we are looking at it, so we can’t comment on it.
”Bryan hurt his shoulder in the game.
”Tomorrow [Sunday] we will go through that and on Monday we will have a report on the injuries.”
The brilliant Habana was noticeably bothered by the left shoulder injury when he appeared at the post-match press conference.
He sustained the injury in a tackle by Ryan Cross as he attempted to ground the ball for a try in the 66th minute.
Habana claimed much of the responsibility for the defeat, disappointed he couldn’t ground the ball.
”The standard I set myself, I feel I let the team down in that situation; I could have maybe finished off better,” he said.
”After having played a lot of rugby and played at the highest level for so long I think I could have maybe done a little better.
”With the pressure I put on myself to make a difference and make a huge contribution to the team, I let myself personally down and I let the rest of the team down.”
The South Africans finished their arduous three-week tour with one win, their thrilling 30-28 victory over the All Blacks in Dunedin, from three Tests, plus a bonus point secured against the Wallabies.
De Villiers said his team was looking forward to getting home and regrouping ahead of their next Tri-Nations match against the All Blacks at Newlands on August 16.
”One out of three is not bad, but it is not what we wanted,” he said.
”We’re not very satisfied with our tour because we came here to try to win all our games.
”But now we can go back home and build on that.”
With his first Tri-Nations at the helm of Australia off to a perfect start and his unbeaten introduction to Test coaching stretching to four matches, Wallabies coach Robbie Deans predicted his side would continue to improve.
The Wallabies play the All Blacks in Sydney next Saturday.
”There is a lot of scope when you start looking at the detail,” Deans said.
”It’s easy to look at the things that you didn’t do but the key will be to add to what we did do.
”We’ll find opportunities to grow and obviously we’ve got a different opponent coming next week and one that will have been sitting here watching, and they will be looking to pick holes in us, so it will be important for us to have an awareness of those needs that we have.” — AFP
