South Africa controversially enforced a scrum in the first action of the match as Manie Libbok purposefully chipped the opening kick-off short and into the hands of Andre Esterhuizen.

The ploy didn’t work overly well in the end as the Boks conceded a free kick, which the Azzurri took quickly and went on the attack.

Backlash and Rassie hits back

Later in the match, the second new tactic debuted, as on two occasions the Springboks created a lineout in open play and formed a maul.

On the first occasion, they managed to draw in a host of Italian defenders with Grant Williams throwing a pinpoint pass out to Canan Moodie, with the latter speeding away to the try line.

Hooker Malcolm Marx would score off the back of the maul on the second attempt after lock Ruan Nortje claimed the ball from a pass from scrum-half Grant Williams.

Erasmus has since revealed that the open-play lineout tactic was a ploy that they copied from a schoolboy rugby team in South Africa after a video of it went viral on social media.

However, these tactics have proven to be controversial and angered many online.

Ex-referee Nigel Owens was one of those to express his concerns over the open-play lineout, posting: “The problem with that play is that you are unable to tackle the player in the air or his support jumpers so you can not defend it or compete.”

This came after a post hit out at the tactic, writing: “Dull, and not in the spirit of the game. It might be ingenuitive, but that doesn’t make it fun in the long term.”

Erasmus has now taken to social media to defend the tactics and pointed to a scrum between the Springboks and Italy, questioning if the latter’s tactics were also not in the spirit of the game.

“I guess one can always argue what is against the spirit of the game!! Some teams avoid scrums and others make sure they get scrums! Who’s wrong,” he wrote.

In the clip, Italy scrum-half Alessandro Fusco feeds the scrums by spinning the ball right through the set-piece, denying any sort of contest. This occured in the first Test between the two teams a week earlier at Loftus.

One reply to Erasmus’ post, read: “The one that deliberately breaks the laws of the game is wrong. That’s normally called cheating no?”

And the Bok head coach opted to reply to this post, he wrote: “Totaly agree like that scrum feed straight to the 8! spot on.”

Gonzalo Quesada’s view

Italy boss Gonzalo Quesada found the tactic to force a scrum from the kick-off disrespectful, but didn’t have issues with the open-field lineouts.

“I didn’t take it very well, they can beat us without needing to do this kind of tactic,” he said.

On the open-play lineouts, he added: “They always have some tricky, nice strikes from lineouts in that zone and we’ve been preparing for it. In that zone, there’s always something a bit special, different or innovative to surprise the opposition.”

Meanwhile, All Blacks boss Scott Robertson was also asked about the tactics that the Springboks deployed and admitted to using similar during playing days in France with Perpignan.