Co-captain James Slipper said ill-discipline from Australia against the relentless Springboks was what ultimately cost the Wallabies in a heavy loss on Saturday.
After taking a surprise early lead through left wing Marika Koroibete, the Aussies just couldn’t cope with the ferocity of the Boks and went down 43-12 in the Rugby Championship clash at Loftus Versfeld.
Second-half yellow cards for hooker David Porecki and winger Suliasi Vunivalu compounded matters, and speaking pitch side after the final whistle, Slipper told SuperSport: “There was an opportunity for us to come here and put in a game that we could be proud of and to be fair, we just defended the whole second half.
“You got to give credit to the Springboks, they put us under pressure; we’ll learn a lot from that. Once again, discipline, and playing at the right end of the field. It’s tough but we’ve got a long year ahead of us so we’ll keep working hard.
“We wanted to play a Wallaby game tonight and I’ll probably say we didn’t deal with the pressure, the discipline put us on the back foot a little bit. We lost two players to the sin bin.
“In Test matches you need to be playing well in those areas, set pieces need to be functioning and need to be playing in the right area of the field, and we just didn’t do that.
“But we’ve got Argentina next week and we’ll go again. Most of the young boys in the squad have never been to SA, so it’s been a great experience for them and playing at Loftus is a tough ask, but as a country we love coming here.”
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