South Africa on Saturday beat Italy 26-0 in their one-off Test match at Newlands, but there is little doubt that the visitors will see this as a moral victory against the world champions.
The visitors — without 13 of their first-choice players, according to coach Nick Mallett — defended superbly, vigorously climbed into the rucks, on occasion spoiled the Boks’ line-out possession and scrummed well.
The Springboks, on the other hand, seemed to lack urgency and made too many errors to inspire confidence two weeks before their first Tri-Nations match against New Zealand — although many of their first-choice players were rested.
Only in their first outing in 1995 did the Boks have a smaller winning margin (19) against Italy than in this Test.
Mallett said that he was happy with his team’s display even though they suffered a defeat. He told the media that his side stuck with his instructions, and some of the players exceeded expectations.
”When you come out with a side that’s missing quite a few key players, you know it’s going to be really difficult,” he said. ”I was praying for rain throughout the week, and it rained throughout the match. It was very hard to run the ball and I thought that the Springboks were very brave to try to run the ball.”
Mallett said his plan was to restrict the Springboks in every way to prevent a runaway score, as had happened in previous meetings between the two sides. ”I make no apologies for the way we played,” he said. ”I wanted to keep the score as low as possible.”
Springbok coach Peter de Villiers felt that his side played the conditions well, even though their victory was far from attractive.
”When I became coach [of South Africa], I always said I would take any win — it does not matter how ugly it was,” said De Villiers. ”Nobody told me how they want me to win. There were chances for us to play but we were very conservative and as a result, a few tries went astray. Italy is one of those teams that drives very well.
”Our scrum was a mixture of good and bad and the match as a whole was a good exercise for us.”
It was a disappointing match, littered with mistakes and poor options. This could perhaps be put down to the rain throughout the week; the intermittent downpours in the first half contributed to a match where the Springboks played it fairly tight.
Italy offered very little on attack. They set the pattern of their play early on with diagonal and high kicks and exploited a number of mistakes by the Springboks who seemed unsettled and lost a line-out in the process.
Then, Bryan Habana, from a free kick 10m out, went on a scintillating run from his goal line to show that the slippery surface was not that bad. Ricky Januarie fed immediately from a quick ruck and the Boks were away with a three-man overlap. Frans Steyn decided to ignore the overlap on his outside, grubbered through and then — thankfully for South Africa — picked up cleanly to score and convert.
At 7-0 after six minutes it seemed that the Boks were on their way to a big score.
The Springbok pack for the first time under De Villiers as coach seemed intent on mauling and drove the visitors back on a number of occasions, with Bismarck du Plessis scoring from such a drive.
Captain Victor Matfield also chose line-outs on the Italian line instead of goalable penalties.
The Springboks were penalised for ruck infringements several times and this helped Italy keep the Boks out. There seemed little urgency from the home side, although this can perhaps be put down to the conditions, which forced a slow, forward game.
Steyn, who had his moments but generally didn’t have a good game at flyhalf with too many wrong options, then had the first of two kicks charged down shortly before the break.
Four minutes before half-time, former Sharks lock Carlo Antonio Del Fava was yellow-carded after a high tackle on Ryan Kankowski, who was replaced by Joe van Niekerk.
Steyn, on the hooter, again neglected his outside backs from a quick ruck and the Springboks went into the change room only 14-0 to the good.
Another maul from a line-out instead of a penalty three minutes after the break gave Du Plessis his second try.
De Villiers and his staff will be relatively worried about the Bok scrum, which was fairly solid but didn’t dominate, albeit against a side that was rated as the best scrummers in the Six Nations — and Irish referee George Clancy didn’t help the Boks with his leniency in the line-outs.
Tendai Mtawarita had a storming run 14 minutes after the break, which brought up the cry ”Beast” from the 36 000-strong crowd before he had another run in the same move to get his first Test try. Steyn’s conversion made it 26-0.
That was about the only excitement from the Boks’ side in the second half, while Italy forced a 5m scrum with eight minutes remaining after a chase following a kick.
Schalk Burger, who had 20 minutes on the field, was quiet — as was to be expected after his long lay-off — and Van Niekerk had a good game in linking with runners when South Africa occasionally played it wide. — Sapa