Northern Edition
Select Edition
Northern Northern
Southern Southern
Global Global
New Zealand New Zealand
France France

'That pisses a lot of people off' - Players, coaches react to scrum annihilation

The England scrum buckles

South Africa’s domination of the England scrum set the tone and the platform for South Africa’s 32-12 Rugby World Cup final win in Yokohama.

ADVERTISEMENT

Despite being 20kg lighter than the 920kg English pack, the South Africans won six scrum penalties in the first half alone, earning kickable points for Pollard and destroying any chance of a set-piece platform for the English.

Springboks’ head coach Rassie Erasmus was however reluctant to divulge too much detail of his plan to undermine one of his opponent’s primary strengths.

“I don’t want to sound very clever afterwards because that pisses a lot of people off. It is a spin-off the way we have played the last five games, keep it tight especially in the six-day turnaround.”

Loosehead Tendai Mtawarira admitted it was an area that South Africa were focusing on.

“As a Springbok pack we take a lot of pride in our set-piece,” noted ‘The Beast’. “All tournament it’s been working for us up front. We went out there to get ascendancy and it was great to get a few penalties in the first half.

Video Spacer

“We wanted to get ascendancy up front. It’s something we have been working on for a long time to improve it. All the hard work paid off tonight. All eight made a huge difference.”

ADVERTISEMENT

He did however off his commiserations to England tighthead Kyle Sinckler. The Harlequin was forced off after just three minutes following an accidental collision England lock Maro Itoje.

“It’s never nice to see a player come off so early in the game. He’s had a great tournament and been playing really well, so I feel sorry for him.”

Replacement Steven Kitshoff was left in awe of the job the Boks frontrow did on England.

“Beast, Mbongi and Frans (Malherbe) put on a massive performance when it came to scrum time. They put the English pack under so much pressure.”

ADVERTISEMENT

England forwards coach Steve Borthwick was magnanimous in face of the superior pack performance of the South Africans.

https://twitter.com/BigDunc123/status/1190561071515328513

“Credit to South Africa for what they did, especially in that first half when they got the ascendancy. We’ll look at it. Do I have the reasons right now? No, I don’t. It’s something we have to look at closely and think about.”

South Africa assistant coach Matthew Proudfoot was understandably proud of his charges’ set-piece performance.

“There is incredible belief in our scrum, in what we do, it’s something the pack really thrive on. We’ve been seeking eight front row forwards.

“We knew in play-off rugby it’s so crucial, we’ve been developing pressure points. I would not say England have any weaknesses at the scrum, they’ve been great. They put New Zealand under pressure.

“We take pride in our scrum. Losing your starting tight-head after a first few minutes must be tough to respond to. It gave us a chance to get a foothold and put pressure on them.”

“That first scrum allowed us to keep applying the pressure. we said after that let’s keep looking for more scrums.

“I must say Beast (Tendai Mtawarira), a man who has 119 caps, stays hungry as anything. On Monday he said, ‘what can I work on in my game’?

“I said, ‘let’s just worry about the final’. He’s been really exceptional and wanting to end his career on a high note. I thought he was great tonight.”

Sam Underhill seemed in the ‘dark’ about what happened: “The dark arts are lost on me, mate, I just get my head down and push. We spoke a bit about it, the boys that needed to speak about it spoke about it. It did get better which is a good thing.”

Springbok tighthead Frans Malherbe: “The game worked out well for us. The scrums went well in the first half and, as a prop forward, there is nothing more you can ask for. Really, really happy with the performance from everyone.

“We tried to isolate ourselves from all those talks going on outside. We had our plan and tried to stick with our plan.

“We only had two training days and the focus was on executing our plan, and all the outside noise and mind-games or whatever.”

Video Spacer
ADVERTISEMENT

Toshiba Brave Lupus Tokyo vs Kubota Spears | Japan Rugby League One 2024/25 Final | Full Match Replay

Saitama Wild Knights vs Kobe Steelers | Japan Rugby League One 2024/25 Bronze Final | Full Match Replay

Boks Office | Episode 42 | Investec Champions Cup Final Review

Spain's Incredible Rugby Sevens Journey to the World Championship Final | HSBC SVNS Embedded | Episode 14

Australia vs USA | Pacific Four Series 2025 | Full Match Replay

New Zealand vs Canada | Pacific Four Series 2025 | Full Match Replay

South Africa vs New Zealand | The Rugby Championship U20's | Full Match Replay

The Game that Made Jonah Lomu

Trending on RugbyPass

Comments

0 Comments
Be the first to comment...

Join free and tell us what you really think!

Sign up for free
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Features

Comments on RugbyPass

P
Poorfour 1 hour ago
300,000 tickets sold and counting for 'era defining' Rugby World Cup

I suspect the major holdback is still for other unions to sell their tickets. One thing I did notice and didn’t know how to quantify is that the major areas of availability seem to be the standing sections in the grounds that have them.


If we assume that those are a) around 5-10% of the total tickets (a guess) and b) there are still around 10-15% held back, then 80% of the available seats would get us to c350k.


I agree with you that the 400k target is very attainable, and this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/articles/c9dqn0g2jdgo


reminded me that we have the Women’s Soccer Euros a month or two ahead of the RWC. A good run there could well stoke additional interest for the rugby, especially as the broadcasters and the sports themselves seem to be getting their act together in terms of promoting a summer of women’s sport.


But even without that, what’s clear is that the tournament has already met its planned sales and that the matches will be well attended, with the bigger ones almost certainly selling out. I imagine that financially we’re now well into upside territory.

10 Go to comments
LONG READ
LONG READ Why the Gallagher Premiership is setting the gold standard in club rugby Why the Gallagher Premiership is setting the gold standard in club rugby
Search