Four tries to three. Nine visits to the opposition 22 against four. One hundred and eleven rucks won against 77. Ninety-five per cent of the ball in the last ten minutes.
Beaten by seven.
There is no version of these All Blacks player ratings that reads like a bad performance, because it was not one. New Zealand were the better rugby team in Cape Town for long stretches and lost anyway, which is a far more uncomfortable place to be than the one they were in at Ellis Park a week ago.
They lost it in two columns. Cheslin Kolbe kicked four penalties, all of them conceded at or around the breakdown, and that is twelve points handed over by a side that has spent the week arguing about scrum legality. Ruben Love kicked three conversions from four. Kolbe kicked seven from seven. Take those two lines out and New Zealand win this Test.
Who’s your All Blacks man of the match? Tell us below.
The front row
The second row
The back row
The halves
The centres
The back three
The bench
Seven of the eight replacements were used.
Best on ground
Ardie Savea. He made the break that produced McKenzie’s try and he scored the one that turned 33-19 into a one-score Test with four minutes left. Eighty minutes, captaining a side that was losing from the first minute to the last, and New Zealand were still attacking South Africa’s line when the whistle went. That does not happen without someone at the back of the scrum refusing to let it end.
The one who has to improve
Ruben Love, at 6, and the reasoning is arithmetic rather than technique.
His conversion attempt after Carter’s try on 65 was from the touchline in Cape Town, which is a genuinely hard kick, and he had already landed three. But it left the score at 30-19 instead of 30-21. Kolbe’s penalty then made it 33-19 rather than 33-21, so when Savea scored on 76 New Zealand trailed by seven instead of five. Seven means the last play has to be a converted try. Five means any try at all draws it.
That is the difference between chasing seven points and chasing five in the last four minutes. New Zealand had 95 per cent of the ball in that period and nine visits to the 22 across the match. They were never short of the field position. They were short of the two points.
He is nine caps into a Test career at fly-half and he was fault-free at altitude last week. This is the harder education.
Ratings summary
| # | Player | Position | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | George Bower | Loosehead prop | 6 |
| 2 | Codie Taylor | Hooker | 6 |
| 3 | Tyrel Lomax | Tighthead prop | 6 |
| 4 | Fabian Holland | Lock | 7.5 |
| 5 | Tupou Vaa’i | Lock | 7 |
| 6 | Simon Parker | Blindside flanker | 6.5 |
| 7 | Luke Jacobson | Openside flanker | 6 |
| 8 | Ardie Savea (c) | No.8 | 8 |
| 9 | Cam Roigard | Scrum-half | 7.5 |
| 10 | Ruben Love | Fly-half | 6 |
| 11 | Leroy Carter | Wing | 7.5 |
| 12 | Jordie Barrett | Inside centre | 6.5 |
| 13 | Quinn Tupaea | Outside centre | 7.5 |
| 14 | Will Jordan | Wing | 7.5 |
| 15 | Damian McKenzie | Fullback | 7.5 |
| 16 | Asafo Aumua | Hooker | 6.5 |
| 17 | Xavier Numia | Prop | 6 |
| 18 | Fletcher Newell | Prop | 6 |
| 19 | Patrick Tuipulotu | Lock | 6.5 |
| 20 | Peter Lakai | Loose forward | 6.5 |
| 21 | Kyle Preston | Scrum-half | 7.5 |
| 22 | Anton Lienert-Brown | Centre | 6 |
| 23 | Josh Moorby | Outside back | unused |
Kyle Preston at 7.5 for nine minutes will read as generous next to Codie Taylor at 6 for forty-eight. That is deliberate. Preston came on and immediately broke a defence that had held for seventy minutes, and the front row that was picked to win a scrum argument was withdrawn en masse by the 53rd minute without winning it. Rate the minutes if you like. The evidence points the other way.
4 comments
ABs wasted hard earned ball by kicking it away. They also could have taken penalty kicks at goal but chose to go for the touchline. Once Marx came on the scrums were disrupted and slow to form, no doubt deliberate to slow the game down. Would not rate Savea the best performing AB on the field, his decision making and that of the other senior players was poor.
Agree
What a load of rubbish, what about the tackle count, 186 tackles made 27 missed and Ardie lead with 17. Some of the other forwards appeared a bit lazy. Fabian was 2nd with 14. George Bower also featured as one of the leading tacklers. Cody Taylor had a very average game, lineouts were very average. Ruebin Love played well, kicked well and rated as one of the lowest. I also thought DMac was very tentative, and slipped over a few times, doesn’t he wear sprigs on his boots.
Love downgraded because he missed 1 kick from the touchline?....you gotta be joking. Did you happen to notice how Mounga and Barret went against the lions?...missed a bunch!