SOUTH Africa's use of the entire bench opened the door for the British and Irish Lions' fightback as the Springboks were forced to hang on for a 26-21 victory in the first Test, home coach Peter de Villiers said.
The world champions led 26-7 after 50 minutes when De Villiers began making replacements, using all seven reserves in the next 20 minutes.
"We scored points but we never really looked in control. I thought we looked a bit flat, so I tried to i
nject some enthusiasm and speed into our game. It didn't happen that way and maybe it was too much, too soon," he said.
One replacement that did work well for the hosts, however, was the return to the fray of captain John Smit for the final four minutes. The Lions had closed the gap to five points when Smit swapped with the injured Deon Carstens, who had come on for him earlier.
"It wasn't part of any plan, Deon hurt his shoulder, but I was happy to get back on and calm the ship," Smit said. "The Lions were coming in waves and we just needed to get our hands on the ball."
De Villiers was full of praise for the Lions, who outscored the Springboks by three tries to two.
"You know, this is a brilliant Lions side, they know what they are doing and they never lie down," he said. "We will need to work on our defence because the cohesion was not there and the guys need to trust each other more. We also need to concentrate for the full 80 minutes."
South Africa used a dominant scrum and superb driving mauls to gain their early control, with loosehead Tendai Mtawarira giving Phil Vickery a torrid time and Smit having no problems adapting to his move from hooker to tighthead.
"I love it when people want to believe that we have a weakness at tighthead. I know John Smit is a brilliant scrummager and I was always believing our scrummaging would be great today," De Villiers said.
New Zealand produced a vastly improved performance from their first Test loss to beat France 14-10 in atrocious conditions in Wellington yesterday.
Ma'a Nonu scored a try as the All Blacks won the second Test to level the series, but France secured the Dave Gallaher Cup for the first time since it was introduced in 2000 by virtue of their five-point win in Dunedin last week. The visitors had been looking to become the first French side since 1994 to win a series against the All Blacks in New Zealand.
Fly-half Stephen Donald (two) and Luke McAlister slotted penalties for the All Blacks. Cedric Heymans scored a brilliant individual try down the left wing, beating four defenders after getting the ball in open space from 40 metres out for France. Julien Dupuy added the conversion while Dimitri Yachvili slotted a penalty for the visitors.
Adam Ashley-Cooper came off the bench to score a try in both halves as Australia cruised to an emphatic 34-12 victory over Italy in their second and final Test in Melbourne.
The full article contains 535 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
