Cape Town - Former Springbok coach Nick Mallett says the All Blacks’ class pull them through against the Springboks in Johannesburg at the weekend.
New Zealand beat South Africa 27-20 in a game they had trailed for large parts, but the world champions kept cool heads in the latter stages to close out the game.
Speaking in the SuperSport studio afterwards, Mallett said:
“If I can discuss some statistics that show how well South Africa played besides a few moments… kicks out of hand, New Zealand 20 South Africa 19, metres run we had 416, they had 454, clean breaks we had nine they had seven. Then 117 carries to their 103, defenders beaten we had 29 to their 18. We only made 105 tackles, they made 117, and that happens very seldom against the All Blacks. The real problem was 11 knock-ons from South Africa and only four for the All Blacks. It just turns on that skill level… It was just the class of this All Blacks team that took it away at the end.”
Mallett was also impressed by captain Richie McCaw’s winning try, after he outfoxed the Boks at a lineout.
“The (final) try that the All Blacks scored, they had an opportunity to go from 20-17 to 20-20, but they kicked to the corner and came up with a lineout move that no one has seen ever. It was brilliant; they are the most innovative team in the world. We’ve never seen that and we didn’t know how to defend against it. Every game they come up with these fantastic new moves, it worked so well… They take seven points and win the game because of that courage; it’s their ability to come up with new ways to score tries that’s better than ours.”