Springboks coach Rassie Erasmus has slammed South Africa’s “really awful” performance in the Rugby Championship opener against Australia, blaming poor game management after a brilliant opening quarter.
The Wallabies, who had not beaten South Africa at Ellis Park since 1963, recovered from trailing 22-0 to beat the reigning world champions 38-22 in Johannesburg.
Captain Harry Wilson scored two tries during the remarkable comeback, with backs Dylan Pietsch, Joseph Aukuso-Suaalii, Max Jorgensen and Tom Wright the other Australian try scorers.
Erasmus lamented the “bad loss” while speaking to reporters during the post-game press conference.
This is one of the most embarrassing press conferences I’ve done in a long time,” Erasmus said.
Not just because we were awful, but they were very good and credit to them.”
He continued: “We didn’t have fight – and that is not what we want to give South Africa.
“When you are 22-0 up, you tend to take chances, but you still need to build an innings or you can end up losing by nearly 20 points like tonight.
“There were so many breaks when Grant Williams, Manie Libbok or Edwill van der Merwe almost got away, but sometimes you have to realise that you are not quite going to get it.
“Their kick-to-ruck ratio was much better than ours – we only kicked nine times in the second half. It’s definitely not wrong to say we overplayed.
“But they did not just tactically outsmart us, but physically too. The longer the game went on, the stronger the Wallabies were.
“It was a bad loss and at some stage our heads and shoulders were down. It was sad that there was no fightback so we gave them a bonus point and did not get one ourselves.
Erasmus also expressed disappointment at how South Africa failed to steal a bonus point despite the team’s flying start.
“The saddest thing is it is five points to them and we didn’t fight back to get the bonus point back, but the Championship is far from over,” he said.
“I can try butter it up and bottle it up to sound cool and respectful, but we were really dogs*** today. The effort was maybe there but the accuracy or precision wasn’t.”
He added: “They beat us in most departments. We as coaches got it terribly wrong and we must look firstly at ourselves.
“We know from now until next Saturday we are going to take a lot of flak; we take the credit when we do well, now we must take the flak when we do badly. We are feeling disappointed and bad for our supporters.”
South Africa captain Siya Kolisi was gracious in defeat, identifying the breakdown as an area of concern for the Springboks.
The things we worked on, like discipline and the breakdown, they did not work,” Kolisi said.
“We let ourselves down and it was unacceptable the way we performed, especially after a start like that.
“Yes, there were errors, but it was the breakdown – we would get into their 22 and they would steal the ball.
“We took our foot off while they kept on fighting. We are not proud of that performance today.
“We will lift ourselves up and fight again next week. Whoever gets the opportunity to play must take it. Thank you to our supporters and sorry for the performance.”
Elsewhere, Australian coach Joe Schmidt hoped the comeback win showed the Wallabies are on the road towards earning respect.
Following a torrid last few years, the victory continues Australia’s resurgence after being well beaten in the first Test against the British and Irish Lions, losing the second by just three points and then winning the dead rubber 22-12.
“This has got to rank very highly in terms of wins and for me personally, since usually you get absolutely swamped here in the last quarter,” Schmidt said.
“The players had to hang in there and I am really proud of the way they did that.
“You have got to earn respect every time you (play), you have to be really competitive in every game.
“We are still building our strength in depth and our game shape, but this is a great bunch of young men who have shown the ability to roll their sleeves up and earn that support.
“They deserve it and I hope there was really good support for them back in Australia.”
South Africa will next host Australia in Cape Town on Sunday, August 24 at 1.10am AEST.