Rassie Erasmus’ verdict on Springboks stars who ‘took their chances’ against Australia
Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus has detailed his delight at his chargers who ‘took their chance’ in the 30-12 victory over the Wallabies, but he was left rueing some missed opportunities.
Erasmus opted to make 10 changes to his Springboks side for the clash in Perth, but he was more than vindicated with a number of players putting their hands up for continued selection.
Aphelele Fassi and Marco van Staden both got their names onto the scoresheet, and elsewhere Ruan Nortje, Johan Grobbelaar and Thomas du Toit also gave a good account of themselves.
Erasmus happy
Speaking to the media after the game, Erasmus stated he was ‘happy’ to see these players ‘take their chance’: “Overall, I think the most pleasing thing was that the weather and a few things that happened in the game, the leaders joined the team [together],” he said.
He added: “I’m very happy for the players who started the game and who haven’t got a lot of chances. I really thought a lot of them took their chances and showed us what they could do.”
Despite expressing his joy with the performances of his fringe players, he was left rueing ‘two or three tries’ they left on the field.
“We’ll do a proper review”
Securing a second-successive win over the Wallabies, and importantly after making so many changes from Test one, it could be easy to get carried away; however Erasmus said his side will do a ‘proper review’ into this victory.
“We do [this] with every other Test match, as we have the different departments,” Erasmus said. “The scrum coaches will go into the scrums until it went uncontested and go and see how Jan-Hendrik Wessels did, how did Johan Grobbelaar do, how did Thomas du Toit do.
He added: “The defence go coach will go into the defence, the attack coach will go into attack, the lineout coach and and and and so on. We’ll do a proper review and give feedback to the guys.
Following the two opening victories against the Wallabies, Erasmus’ side now prepare for two back-to-back fixtures against the All Blacks in what could be the deciding fixtures in this Rugby Championship.
