The Springboks will depart for New Zealand on Sunday with a mission accomplished after completing their third biggest victory over Australia in a 43-12 (halftime 17-5) Castle Lager Rugby Championship victory at Loftus Versfeld. Springbok captain Duane Vermeulen was all smiles as he reflected on the performance.
“It was a special performance and it’s a special group of guys,” he said. “It’s not just the players, it’s the coaches and the management – everyone – someday it will all come to an end and you know you’ve just got to enjoy every single minute and second of it.
“Australia fetched a big pack and we are still a bit rusty with things we can work on – scrum wise with a couple of free kicks and penalty against us – but later on as we went on in the game we found our feet and we grew really in confidence. That’s some of the things we are happy about, but it’s test match rugby and you’ve got to be on song from the start and you can’t ease into the game.”
Vermeulen said the team was powered to victory by the 50 000-strong crowd and that he hoped the team’s send off at the end of the month against Argentina at Emirates Airline Park would be similarly inspiring.
“It was fantastic coming out seeing the support,” he said, “from singing the anthem onwards and every single player at every scrum, lineout we could hear the people and it’s that extra energy and like having a 16th man on the field – it really pushed us through.
“Before we go to the World Cup when we play our last match at Emirates Airline Park, it would be tremendous to have a full stadium again. We had a chat to the CEO of the Bulls and he said they could have sold out the stadium about three times for today’s test.
“The support we have in South Africa is phenomenal and from our side we’d just like to say ‘thank you’ to every single person who was out there – it really is fantastic.”