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Jean: Win showed character

Pretoria - One win is not enough for South Africa to believe that they are out of the losing habit, Springboks centre Jean de Villiers said after the Tri-Nations victory over Australia on Saturday.

"We've been in a negative spiral so, once you win, you want to keep on winning," De Villiers said after the 44-31 win at Loftus Versfeld ended a four-match losing streak.

"If we play badly next week, then the pressure is just back on us again. We need back-to-back performances because we can't take one step forward and then two steps back."

The Springboks, who have surrendered their Tri-Nations title to New Zealand, meet Australia again next Saturday in Bloemfontein.

In Pretoria, they recovered from a poor start to beat the Wallabies and De Villiers said they had shown character and experience.

"We've been through a lot in the last couple of months and then we were down 21-7. It took character and the leadership in the team to turn that around. We showed again that we are a good team, we can win the tight games.

"To come back like we did, to put everything behind us, really showed character and the experience of the many guys who have been in these positions in the past," added De Villiers, who earned his 62nd cap.


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