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Hard work paid off - Div

Pretoria - Coach Peter de Villiers was relieved after South Africa ended a four-match Tri-Nations losing streak by defeating Australia 44-31 at Loftus Versfeld Saturday.

Having come close before falling by seven points against runaway champions New Zealand last weekend, the under-pressure coach felt his team were not as bad as recent results suggested.

"I always knew we could do it but it is nice to sit here tonight and say that we did do it," he said.

De Villiers described the win as a culmination of hard work off the pitch coming into effect on it.

"We worked a lot over the past three weeks to reverse the whole thing and last week we came very close but when we got that try from Juan (Smith), we realised we can play and in the last 70 minutes the score was 37-10 in our favour."

A nine-try match reflected the frantic tempo and De Villiers was satisfied with the work of his substitutes.

"All the reserves who came on did what we wanted from them. Last week they came on and they did not have that impact so it is good to see the change," he said.


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