SA Rugby
A 45-metre penalty goal by Quade Cooper, after the final siren had sounded, edged the Wallabies to a 28-26 victory over a shattered Springboks, on a night of high drama in the Castle Lager Rugby Championship on Queensland’s Gold Coast on Sunday.
Cooper steered the ball unerringly through the poles from wide on the right to take his personal tally to 23 points, while the Boks will rue four missed kicks on a day when they outscored the Wallabies by three tries to one.
Springbok head coach Jacques Nienaber singled out ill-discipline as the main factor behind the Boks' defeat.
“Poor discipline cost us – 23 points off the kicking tee (for the Wallabies) summed it up,” said Nienaber, who added that there were defining moments in the match, but it was the last 20 minutes that proved to be the most decisive in the result.
“In the first 20 minutes, I thought we dominated and had control over the game, and we were unable to do this in the last 20 minutes.
The Boks conceded 11 penalties – seven of which were in range for Cooper, which he duly converted into points – while they also had to play for 20 minutes with only 14 players after Siya Kolisi and Willie le Roux were yellow carded.
“We didn’t play the way we wanted to on the day, and their plan worked better than ours in certain areas.”
The Springboks will meet the Wallabies again on Saturday, 18 September, at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane before taking on the All Blacks in back-to-back matches on Saturday, 25 September in Townsville, and Saturday, 2 October in Gold Coast.
Scorers:
Springboks 26 (11) – Tries: Bongi Mbonambi, Malcolm Marx (2). Conversion: Handre Pollard. Penalty goals: Pollard (3).
Australia 28 (19) – Try: Andrew Kellaway. Conversion: Quade Cooper. Penalty goals: Cooper (7).
(Source: SA Rugby)
