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Key was not panicking - Smit

Brenden Nel - SuperSport

Pretoria - Springbok captain John Smit pointed to the team’s experience that helped them surge back after going 21-7 down in the first 10 minutes to come back and beat the Wallabies 44-31 in their Tri-Nations fixture at Loftus Versfeld.

Smit said there was no panic behind the posts when things went wrong early on and the Boks continued to believe in themselves as they clawed their way back into the game, before taking control.

“It's complicated when you start like that. There’s a couple of ways you can see it. You can see it like a handicap and not concern yourself with it, knowing there are 60-70 minutes ahead to get back into the game,” Smit said at the post match press conference.

“We know we made one or two mistakes that gifted them tries but we also knew we have the whole game ahead of us. There was no inexperience or panic in the team and thankfully a few guys have seen this before and come back from it.”

Test centurion Victor Matfield, who became the first Springbok to win his 100th Test match with the victory, said the players had simply believed in themselves and their game plan as they came back from the horror beginning.

“Luckily we are experienced enough to know that when you start like that, you have to stick to the things you know and you don’t go out of your game plan. We stuck to what we knew and things started to happen for us. I think it also helped the way the Wallabies wanted to play, it gave us the freedom to play and we knew if we played then things would happen for us,” Matfield said.

Smit paid homage to his vice-captain, who received a rousing welcome at his home ground, but said both he and Matfield were relieved the milestones were over.

“It’s a huge testimony to the type of guy Victor is – he didn’t make a big thing about it and the only time we would have known it is an occasion was when we saw the 100 on his jersey. We didn’t say we wanted to do it for Victor, but rather that we do it for each other, so that Victor could have a celebration tonight,” Smit said.

“Victor and I are relieved that it is done and dusted and now it is time to start on the next chapter. But we do that one day at a time and we know how much we need to improve and how much work there is for us to be ready for next year. It’s not all about this Tri-Nations, it is about being ready for next year’s seven week process.”

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