MENDOZA, Argentina, August (ANA) - Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus made no excuses for his side’s 32-19 loss in their Rugby Championship clash against Argentina on Saturday in Mendoza.
Argentina raced into a 27-7 point lead at the break but there would be no now-somewhat typical Bok comeback as the hosts held firm for a famous win.
While there is expected to be a bigger fallout from the loss, the South African coach Rassie Erasmus shouldered much of the blame for his side’s poor display a week on from their Durban win.
“Overall, yes we are very disappointed – not just with the defensive effort,” said Erasmus.
“In the first 15-20 minutes, we had so many opportunities to score some tries and we just didn’t capitalise on any of them.”
Erasmus was scathing in his assessment of his side’s wastefulness and lack of precision in attack but refused to name players who did not measure up, instead, he took full responsibility for the disappointment.
“In a Test match, you just don’t get that many of opportunities. We played like a team that was playing club rugby. And I’ll have to point the finger at myself because when you perform like this then the coach must’ve done something badly wrong in the week.
“It’s not an excuse ... we had a few changes and the young guys, you know, are going to have games like this where they are rattled. I’m not going to say we are going to learn from this. We had a terrible performance and it was unacceptable.
“We can’t perform like that in a Springbok jersey.”
The visibly frustrated Erasmus also revealed further effects of the loss with a forced change to his plans for the rest of the Rugby Championship.
“This match kind of threw some plans out of the window. We wanted to give a few other guys the chance to play against Australia but we can’t do that now. It’s got to be back to winning ways ... we need to win at all costs now.”
- Africa News Agency (ANA)
