Good night for SA rugby. Sad night for the Wallabies.

You have to feel for Australia. Surely they're in the Guiness Book of Records for injuries. I mean for goodness sake depending on where you put Beale they have an entire backline out! That's cruel luck. Deans will probably be gone with the November tour but if that proves the case MacKenzie will struggle to turn things round in a hurry with so many top players missing.

Australia's misfortune though is SA's gain. You could see in the body language in the SA players tonight that this victory meant a lot to their confidence. They will go in to next week's match in Soweto with real confidence and rightly so. They looked good out there tonight. They're certainly not the finished article and their goal kicking is still a concern but the passes were sticking out there tonight and the selections seemed right.

I really feel for Australia but in a way they can use their injuries as an excuse. SA had to win to make Meyer understand what he had wrong with tactics and selections before and in a way he has been cornered into making these changes and it was important for SA rugby that those positive changes paid off. I think largely they did and though this match really doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things, it means far more for SA rugby.

It takes a big man to say he got things wrong and whilst Meyer never really overtly spoke along those lines he has taken criticism on board and he has made the right changes and you can see there has been an evolution in SA's game this 4N. They would've felt frustrated they played well enough to beat NZ last week. They didn't let Australia into this game until it was too late and they finished strongly, as they should've with a numerical advantage.

So now they approach the NZ game in the right frame of mind. They need to go out there and take the game to NZ. They shouldn't be defensive. They need to control possession and harry NZ ball but they look good with ball in hand. Be smart about kicking and build pressure by retaining possession and asking questions of the NZ defence. They must take their opportunities at goal because accumulating points against NZ is the best way of pressuring them into mistakes. Dominating possession is not enough.

So looking forward to the Pumas game tonight. SA have an extra day's rest and don't have to travel far so their preparation is ideal. Let the confidence build and come into that match feeling they are going to take the game to NZ rather than be too conservative. Australia, on the other hand, had non contested scrums tonight. Maybe they could ask to have a non contested match next week and negotiate for a draw or a last minute win for Argentina. Sort of like WWF rugby. It just doesn't seem fair to have them play when they have that many injured players. Of course the Pumas would think otherwise but even they deep down would prefer to beat a full strength Wallaby side rather than a pub team hobbled together from a social media competition. Sadly they're not that far off that. It's surreal and any side would get my sympathy faced with that many injuries.

Yep, SA played very well tonight although the last try should never have been given, massive forward pass which no one seemed to acknowledge. Still, SA deserved the scoreline and win.

Australia - injuries aside have sunk to new lows and Deans will surely be heading towards the exit. The morale has all but gone and they were rudderless. They can't keep hiding behind the injury excuse. Argentina will be licking their lips at the prospect of turning over that motley crew next weekend

I dont think i have ever seeen a game with so many injurie to one side..Every other phase of play some one went down. But lets give credit to SA, they realy wanted the win and they kept Australia out of the game with their defence.

Australia though never seemed to be able to get the ball wide. Was that realy because of SA defence? Or was it more to do with Australia not spreading out far enough? ( the players) that is.

I was a bit confused at the end when Rolan would not let the Aussie Hooker on the field because they have already had 7 subs on.

I would love an uncontested match next week. Is there any chance of snow? All we need is for Deans to pull a hammy getting on the bus and we'll have a full house. This season can't end quickly enough.

Our woes aside, I was happy for the boks tonight. They played with gusto and width and looked good in the process but can't imagine they'll be pleased with all the points they bombed. They really should have racked up 50 tonight.

Full Credit, you're an aussie? Do you want Deans out or keep him?

Yes, everyone looked good. Ruan looked much better, JDV and Kirchner as well. Although I think JDV had more to do with him playing at 12 again.

It was though that Australia had to play with 14 when they made too much substitutions. First time that I saw something like that.

I think it's time for the next coach. He's had 4-5 years to do something with this side but they haven't managed to string more than 2 good games together in a row and we've had some fairly embarrassing losses along the way. I don't doubt Deans' credentials but for whatever reason he's just not getting it done with this team. I have no idea whether the next candidate will do any better but we can't keep going down this path.

The AI series always seemed far off in the 4N until today. Now it seems scarily close and not long enough to get many players back. Plus they play NZ in October. Normally they jump at the chance to get a morale boosting win like in Hong Kong. Now it seems it might do more harm than good. The players could all do well with having now until the Super season off. Who cares their rankings suffer. It's well past being a farce.

I am of the opinion you can indeed use the injuries as an excuse. Every ruck seemed to have a Wallaby player down. How must your mindset be when you take the ball up or go into a tackle? When has Deans had anywhere near a full compliment to work with? I agree he hasn't been good either but I think if people think MacKenzie is the answer to all Australia's problems in November then I think they're mistaken. He can certainly turn things round with a healthier environment and a more positive feeling. But let me put it like this. Imagine NZ goes into a match and either before or during the game lose Woodcock, Franks, Hore, Whitelock, McCaw, Read, A Smith, Carter, Nonu, C Smith, Jane, Gear and Savea and Dagg goes into flyhalf, do you think the replacements would look any good?

Maybe even Wales can beat them in November! Deans surely will go after thsi championship

I think it's inevitable. But McKenzie will find it tough with so many players out.

I agree that you can't really blame Deans when we have a whole first XV missing but that doesn't explain our generally poor record under him when we've had a full (or near enough to) compliment. Under Deans we've lost all our recent matches against the home nations bar Wales (x2 against Scotland and England). We lost to Samoa in Sydney and had our worst ever 10 match losing streak against NZ. Not to mention coming within a bees of losing to Argentina at home last week. He has about the worse record of any Australian coach. Not exactly the stuff of legends.

I don't mind losing games but the way in which we're losing is what's troubling. There's no flair, no attack, no hunger, no apparent game plan or structure. The Wallabies used to be able to score from anywhere at any stage of the game. These days we're lucky if we score a try and it's usually from pick and drives.

Deans is the coach and the buck stops with him. If I were the coach and players weren't implementing my game plan I'd hook them quickly and get someone in who could. He's obviously satisfied that they're trying to do what he's told them to do which is very concerning in itself. He says in public that he doesn't want silly little grubber kicks yet we do them all game long and the players are left out there. I don't get it.

Full Credit wrote:I agree that you can't really blame Deans when we have a whole first XV missing but that doesn't explain our generally poor record under him when we've had a full (or near enough to) compliment. Under Deans we've lost all our recent matches against the home nations bar Wales (x2 against Scotland and England). We lost to Samoa in Sydney and had our worst ever 10 match losing streak against NZ. Not to mention coming within a bees of losing to Argentina at home last week. He has about the worse record of any Australian coach. Not exactly the stuff of legends.

I don't mind losing games but the way in which we're losing is what's troubling. There's no flair, no attack, no hunger, no apparent game plan or structure. The Wallabies used to be able to score from anywhere at any stage of the game. These days we're lucky if we score a try and it's usually from pick and drives.

Deans is the coach and the buck stops with him. If I were the coach and players weren't implementing my game plan I'd hook them quickly and get someone in who could. He's obviously satisfied that they're trying to do what he's told them to do which is very concerning in itself. He says in public that he doesn't want silly little grubber kicks yet we do them all game long and the players are left out there. I don't get it.

He also had 7 in a row against SA, which no one else in his time did.

True, but I'd say that says more about the state of SA rugby than ours. From memory most of those games were 50/50 and it could have easily been the other way around.

You could say the same about their losses to NZ FC. I fully understand the call for a change of coach. In NZ he'd be receiving death threats no doubt with his record. But just when Australia looked right, they got an injury and exposed their soft underbelly of reserves. I think JOC has been the most crucial loss.

I think McKenzie can only do better but the same problems will always be there.

I have two things to say:

1) SA. Well, as just about every back seat coach in the entire world realised a new combinator was required with a new tactics. And a great SA performance. Habana evening coming out of on-field retirement to show he is still a great finisher and thinking football player!

2). AUS. Did they flatter to decieve? This was a team seriously riddled with injuries, that could not keep a full compliment of players onto the field for 80 minutes just through injury!

A seriously disjointed AUS never threatened SA. Except Once. And this is my point.

How compressed and narrow was the SA defence ALL night? Look where Lambie is defending when AUS went over! there is 15 meters between him and the touch line.

It was like this ALL night. Seriously look if you didn't spot it. The narrow channel was compressed and AUS just kept hitting it.

The thing that would worry me is by the 70 minute mark they were still making great progress through this channel despite the defence.

Both Habana and Kirchner were standing out of the defensive line (even as it was) to look for the intercept.

There are ACRES of undefended real estate for someone like Savea, Dagg, Jane to exploit with fast service from Aaron Smith and Ma'a Nonu, and an accurate cross-kick game from someone like Carter.

I don't know if this was a deliberate tactic by SA because they work out AUS were so limited, or if the new-look back division is not being marshalled properly from 9 and 13... If it's the latter then I can smell an Ireland style pasting in on the air.

I don't know if McKenzie will be the messiah or not but it's worth a shot to find out, can it get any worse? He did take the Reds from nobodies to champions. Importantly he has been a Wallaby and knows the Aussie mindset. We all saw the Reds struggle this year with injuries so we know McKenzie doesn't have a magic potion to heal the sick and gift the ordinary but when he has a decent roster you get a decent performance. With Deans all you seem to get these days, regardless of injuries, is mediocrity. The last complete performance I can remember was the Trinations decider in Brisbane last year... how many games have we had since then?

AWOP, it is called a drift defence, the try was an overlap created by beale who beat Hougaard by going inside out and then around him.

Anyway.

Two things that stood ou tonight, even when you don't change a gameplan, but you have a pivot that attacks the gainline by stading flatter it makes a huge difference.

Secondly, goosen may not have been brilliant tonight, after all it was his first start, but the whole team looked enrgised and were making better decisions tonight.

Must say, it was good to see what it meant for goosen and Taute to be in the starting line up when the anthem was sung.

It wasn't drifting Biltong. There is my point. It seemed only that AUS were pathologically unable to get the ball wide that saved it.

You could watch as they engineered massive overlaps at least 5-6 times but then couldn't physically funnel the ball to the wide players for love or money. And when the ball get there, that player was already being carted off injured...

'Fans' are so fickle

anotherworldofpain wrote:It wasn't drifting Biltong. There is my point. It seemed only that AUS were pathologically unable to get the ball wide that saved it.

You could watch as they engineered massive overlaps at least 5-6 times but then couldn't physically funnel the ball to the wide players for love or money. And when the ball get there, that player was already being carted off injured...

No they weren't drifting often, because they didn't have to.

Congrats Biltong, Fern & Co.

The Boks starting to look more enterprising and well done to them. They had all the momentum early and were able to get beyond the gain line with ease and the backs looked strong carrying it forward too.

Nothing much Oz can do about game plans & tactics when the deck has to be shuffled every 5 minutes. Can't believe all the injuries. We were so lucky it could have been a 50+ points hiding yet a few players never quit even when we were a man down.

Biltong wrote:

anotherworldofpain wrote:It wasn't drifting Biltong. There is my point. It seemed only that AUS were pathologically unable to get the ball wide that saved it.

You could watch as they engineered massive overlaps at least 5-6 times but then couldn't physically funnel the ball to the wide players for love or money. And when the ball get there, that player was already being carted off injured...

No they weren't drifting often, because they didn't have to.

Fair enough. Let us wait and see how clinically it is implemented when the line is put under pressure quickly. My feeling was they just didnt get caught out. You could say "they didn't need to"...I guess we will see. It certainly is a change though.

Condolences LB, it is difficult to be critical of an australian team that finished the game with 14 men due to injuries.

I am releived that Meyer must now consider positive play is the way forward and not negative rugby.

I am trying to think how many kicks there were in the game, couldn't have been that many?

anotherworldofpain wrote:

Biltong wrote:

anotherworldofpain wrote:It wasn't drifting Biltong. There is my point. It seemed only that AUS were pathologically unable to get the ball wide that saved it.

You could watch as they engineered massive overlaps at least 5-6 times but then couldn't physically funnel the ball to the wide players for love or money. And when the ball get there, that player was already being carted off injured...

No they weren't drifting often, because they didn't have to.

Fair enough. Let us wait and see how clinically it is implemented when the line is put under pressure quickly. My feeling was they just didnt get caught out. You could say "they didn't need to"...I guess we will see. It certainly is a change though.

You must be rather disappointed that our attacking play for once was not neanderthalic?

You kicked less it seemed and ran a lot more - which is great news from your p.o.v. We probably kicked more. Some good ones from Beale which were made under pressure but still those risky short kicks which simply turned the ball back over on a few occasions.

No, Biltong! I was overjoyed. SA showed what they can do! And this is why I was so frustrated with the Steyn years.

Linebreaker wrote:You kicked less it seemed and ran a lot more - which is great news from your p.o.v. We probably kicked more. Some good ones from Beale which were made under pressure but still those risky short kicks which simply turned the ball back over on a few occasions.

Almost a life-time achievement for that little kick through, regather and offload though! It so deserved a try on the end of it. But not Australia's day.

Linebreaker wrote:You kicked less it seemed and ran a lot more - which is great news from your p.o.v. We probably kicked more. Some good ones from Beale which were made under pressure but still those risky short kicks which simply turned the ball back over on a few occasions.

I just checked the stats, on an australian stat website, we kicked 21 times and OZ 19 times, Goosen only kicked 4 times, passed 17 times, made 4 runs and broke the defnece once. A decent return for his first game.

I thought he was a bit unlucky on the try. It deserved a try, but the call was fair.

Inches in it, like the second Kirchner effort. Could have made the score a massive blow out...especially if you guys could turn up a decent kicker.

Oh, so pretty close. Goosen unlucky not to score another try I thought.

Those little through kicks were made under high pressure with little support on offer to run it or have enough players to beat the defence. I always panic when they try that when behind on the scoreboard but they are great on the odd ocassion they come off.

Well done SA in what must be their best test win in a couple of years. I do feel a little justified over my excessive ranting in that its been the presence of Steyn, beautifully labelled a `handbrake` in one of our papers here, more than the presence of a replacement has stifled SAs rugby over the last two years. Good start from goosen considering the pressure on him...the things he must have read over the last few months.

But all in all welcome back to SA rugby. That's the boks I'm more used to seeing. They'll be confident going into next weeks match this time, and perhaps for the first time in a couple of years, with genuine reasons for doing so.

Oz really are in a trough, not so much because of their injuries but more so because of their difficulty in replacing them. I've never really rated deans and although not his fault he doesn't have players and he's just not handled the situation well enough.

So if NZ lose tonight, then SA beat NZ with a bonus point, they take the first 4Nations.

What are the odds on that now? Must be shortening...

Havnt worked it out properly but its a little flawed when a side with less wins can win a tournament through bonus points but its even for all teams so that's the way it is.

Hansens year will be defined by the next three tests and he knows it.

Very entertaining first half (probably more so for bok fans than AUS fans): the second half was abit like an episode of ER. Much as Biltong has said above, it is intriguing how just replacing Morne with Goosen, changes the attitude of the entire team: everyone was keen to run and offload.

I think credit is due to the likes of Beale, who kept on giving it a go even when it was a lost cause; and some of the Aussie forwards, who kept at it despite all the injuries (I hope the AUS U18 team are fit and ready - they must be expecting a call up any moment )

ANy news on AAC. He really did go out for the count.

They would have got the same effect with anyone prepared to not sit in the pocket all day. Lambie should have been there from the first english test and the results to date would have been better. Mornes presence was killing the boks, and unfortunately it took until the totally predictable nightmare against NZ to remove him. Meyer doesn't get a lot of credit in that respect. The obvious has been well overdue and look at the difference. Morne was poison, no doubt about it.

anotherworldofpain wrote:So if NZ lose tonight, then SA beat NZ with a bonus point, they take the first 4Nations.

What are the odds on that now? Must be shortening...

Interesting indeed.
Unlikely but SA could win this tournament despite-
- not winning the most matches
- not winning a single away match

Bizzare!
Especially ironic in that they'll do it through scoring more tries!

Yet the real reason will be because they've played two teams in this tournament. A morne c side for the first three, and a morne less A side for the remaining three.

Well done SA looks like an emphatic performance.

Good to see SA being guilty of what's usually reserved for others...forward passes. The last to habana was one or two yards. But that's part of rugby today. Chance your arm and if it doesn't get picked up so be it.

Its the sheer increase in the number of opportunities that become available that causes it and the ABs are throwing them all the time...all guilty because of the momentum going forward making a back pass often difficult at pace.

Can't say SA are not capable of scoring try's at the death anymore.

Geez M Steyns presence last two years really has been shown up here. Its like the shackles have been removed.

SAs problem now is complacency for next week. The ABs have what is confirmed by the stats THE toughest match they can possibly have next week so motivation won't be a problem. Especially if they lose to Argie.

How good were they? Or how depleted were oz in its contribution here?

Yes, australia were surprisingly effective at times with such a depleted line up.

Looks like AAC is also going to be ok. Great news.

Yip took a bit of a thumping today, but at last we saw a spark of something in the side, even though it was at the end of a beating, but the blokes out there were still going for it. this could make it hard hard for Quade to come back when he's fit, would he still have kept going when the chips were so down or would his spirit had gone when we were down?

Await the Phoenix rising from the ashes......

Good night for 606v2 as we won't have to be subjected to constant whining about Meyer day in day out....when is Bryce Lawrence's next game?

Actually it was more a good day for SA rugby as the game was at 3:30pm. It was pretty dark and grim though in Madrid when I was writing it.

Roll on next week. I can't wait for the SA NZ game. The butterflies are already there.

Yes regardless the trophy isn't at stake this is still the tough match for the ABs.

And what a difference the new players have made. I'm not totally convinced with goosen yet but he's done ok. Just looked hesitant at times. Its more the absence of steyn that's given this side a different look and SA looked like they wanted to move the ball but sometimes appeared as though they didn't know how to- something the ABs are often guilty of. So that's a good thing.

But next week will the boks have the same confidence to move the ball against a side who defend it well? They're new to this at this level and strong heads will be needed.

I think a pretty predictable result. Both Bok and wallabie pundits were predicting a possible blowout. A repeat of 97 was on. Good signs for world rugby with the boks running the ball and Habana scoring tries.

It's hard to ever feel sorry for the wallabies, but they must have had about the worst run in injuries of aany side for a long while. A weakened side further decimated by injuries. When was the last time a major side ran out of replacements before the end of the game, and ended up with a man short. The bad news is they'll hit a fired up Argentinian side in a weeks time.

Dean's fate is probably sealed, we just have to wait and see who replaces him, and where he goes to next. It's hard to see anyone turniong it around quickly, if no other reason the injury toll.

Meyer must be a happy man. A good display against Australia and running rugby. It'll lesson the vitriol for a week. he has the beauty of facing the AB's at home next week. Probably the only team, bok's fan's will forgive a loss to (as long as it's narrow). If he can meld the traditional tight game of the bulls with a more expansive game, the boks are going to be very, very strong.