Erasmus and Kriel Take Defeat on the Chin

Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus and captain Jesse Kriel were both bitterly disappointed by the team’s 24-17 defeat against the All Blacks in Auckland on Saturday, which dashed their hopes of beating the hosts for the first time at Eden Park since 1937, and attributed the result to 15 poor minutes of play in the match.

They both lauded the team’s fightback from 14-3 down at halftime to snatch a losing bonus point and said they would regroup and try to fix the errors that cost them in the coming week before the teams meet again next Saturday in Wellington.

“We were 14 points behind after two easy tries, and we found ourselves chasing our own tails, and that was in the rain as well,” said Erasmus.

“I thought the replacements brought energy, and we fought back well, but it’s tough to win if you are 14 points behind.”

Erasmus singled out individual errors as one of the complications in the match: “We made two individual errors and they scored tries, and the other times they had to grind, so it’s frustrating.

“It’s not always the same players making the mistakes, and some of them were stupid errors. But as coaches, we pick the players, and as management, we have to sometimes put up our hands and say we got it wrong.”

Erasmus again shot down the hype from his team’s perspective surrounding the Boks’ results at Eden Park, and he also congratulated the All Blacks for maintaining their winning run at the ground dating back to 1994.

“If we had won, we would probably have mentioned the history, but they managed to maintain their record at Eden Park and well done to them for that,” said Erasmus.

“It was a great challenge for us, but we didn’t achieve it. That said, we have another chance to face them next week, and that will be our focus next week.”

Asked if there were positives they could take from the clash, Erasmus said it’s hard to take positives from a defeat.

“But I suppose the one positive is that we are still in the race for the Castle Lager Rugby Championship title, and if one looks at the match, we played badly for 15 minutes, and as the game progressed, we got better,” said the Bok coach.

“We are very disappointed, but we played the No 1 team in the world, and we have to put everything into trying to win next week.”

Kriel, who captained the Boks for the first time against the All Blacks, echoed his coach’s sentiments: “We always knew New Zealand wanted a fast start to the game, but we are still in the Rugby Championship competition, as Rassie said, and we have another chance to face them next week.

“We played badly for a few minutes, and it cost us, which is very disappointing, but we’ll have another go next week, and hopefully things will go better for us.”