‘We was off – South Africa deserved to win’ – Andy Farrell laments Ireland’s slip in standards after Loftus defeat

However, the Ireland head coach was left frustrated by his own side's performance in a 27-20 loss, after a breathless last 15 minutes that saw both sides score two tries and lose a man each to the sin-bin.

Ireland were frustrated by a pair of decisions and one non-call from the Television Match Official Ben Whitehouse who disallowed James Lowe's try for a technical ruck offence, allowed Cheslin Kolbe's when Lowe appeared to have played the ball in touch and didn't intervene when Ireland felt Craig Casey had been rag-dolled illegally by RG Snyman.

Player ratings as Ireland lose to South Africa

Casey was concussed and will likely miss the second Test in Durban, while Dan Sheehan is a major doubt with a knee issue and Farrell alluded to other injuries with Robbie Henshaw coming off at half-time. Jamie Osborne should be fit despite coming off with a groin injury.

The coach acknowledged the world champions were the better side.

"In the cold light of day, I thought South Africa deserved to win the game," he said.

"First half, I thought we was off. We gave away access for them to be able to play their game.

"Defensively, we was a bit passive, certainly for the first try but then the story of the game for me, after some words at half-time, I thought it was courageous the way we defended and got ourselves back into the game."

Although he didn't give full voice to his frustration, you could tell Farrell was simmering over some of the officiating.

"Well, it’s not for me to say, is it? I saw quite a few of them live and I had a dubious thought about it but that’s life, isn’t it? We’ll go through the right channels and make sure we do things properly.

"You’ll make of it what you want. We have to go through the right channels. Lucky, unlucky? That’s the game."

Casey was up and walking in the dressing-room, said Farrell, who suggested there was more to the incident which went unpunished by Luke Pearce.

"It is what it is. That's the sport. It's difficult to referee, you just want consistency, Sometimes it goes for you and sometimes it doesn't," he said.

"You can make your own decision on the Craig thing."

Lowe might have been the hero had his try been allowed to stand, but instead a pair of decisions he made cost Ireland dear.

The first was terrible luck as he attempted to keep Handre Pollard's penalty to touch in-field back-fired when Kolbe pounced brilliantly, while the second was a poor error as he played Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu goal-line bound restart seconds after Conor Murray's try.

Instead of an Irish scrum on half-way, South Africa powered over for a penalty try and while Ryan Baird did score late on that was the game.

"Yeah, you've got to make your own look as well, haven't you - by covering bases.

"We know they're a team that fights for those scraps and we needed to be better in those instances."

"It was a special play by Kolbe, to chase that ball. It’s one of the reasons they won the World Cup, with

him chasing down the kicker in France, but we were slack in not backing James up.

"You’ll make your own decision on whether he still had the ball in his right hand or whether the ball hit him as he threw the ball back into field and his foot was in touch. That’s for us all to debate.

"It's an error (the second one). It's an error. I've no doubt James will put his hand up to that.

"It's fool's gold, isn't it? Some of the kick-offs as well, Craig caught and we end up 20m from our own line. If you've got the courage to let it bounce, it goes dead. At the same time, if it bounces up you look stupid. We don't know either way."

Farrell says he will need more from his side in Durban.

"Quite a bit actually. I suppose the main thing is that we want to attack the game the way we want to do it, not being desperate next week just because we've lost this week," he said.

"I think discipline cost us, the penalty count wasn't outrageous but the way we put pressure on ourselves, relieved pressure for them is what we need to address.

"There's some great learnings from the first-half that we put right in the second-half, we weren't clinical enough when we had chances on the Springboks line.

"You've got to convert in big games like this, there's no doubt about that.

"We were still in the game and that says to you we still have a chance."