SOUTH AFRICA head coach Heyneke Meyer hailed Fourie du Preez as a “tactical genius” after his captain called and finished off the move that clinched a dramatic win at Twickenham.
The Springboks were trailing 19-18 with five minutes left in this frenetic quarter-final when du Preez instructed his men to roll out a pre-planned manoeuvre off the back of a scrum. No.8 Duane Vermuelen produced an outrageous “back door” pass to send his skipper in at the corner, beating the dive of Alex Cuthbert.
Meyer said both the invention and execution were typical of his skipper. “I would like to kiss Fourie. He’s the most astute player I’ve ever coached. He’s a tactical genius and he really wants to win. I thought they should keep the ball in [the scrum]: sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. I’ve always said that coaching is overrated; you have to be able to pick guys with character. Knock-out rugby is not about who plays the best rugby, it’s just about character. Fourie was brilliant.”
Du Preez came back into the old just before the tournament after an absence of more than a year because of ankle and knee complaints. With other senior figures like Jean de Villers and Victor Matfield also succumbing to injury, his leadership has had to come to the fore, not least in the wake of the shambolic opening day defeat to Japan.
Typically unassuming, he sought to pass on the acclaim for his try to Vermuelen. “Credit to him for an unbelievable pass. To give it at that moment shows what a big-match player he is.”
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The Springbok’s counterpart, Sam Warburton, was left to rue the Welsh penalty count, particularly in the first half where it was the men in red who looked to have settled the quicker.
“If you look at some of those penalties, they’re a pretty soft three points,” said the openside. “We gave away four penalties all of which we weren’t under much pressure. Those 12 points were the most crucial we gave away. Going out of the tournament now feels very premature. I feel ready to go again for another two weeks if I had to. I felt physically we were in a good place, and we just got caught out at the end. The changing room was very quiet; it’s difficult to find the words at that time. It’s sinking in that we’re going home.”
Some of Warren Gatland’s comments suggested he might be looking to borrow one of the dart boards with Wayne Barnes’ mugshot that have been so prevalent in his native New Zealand since 2007, but he was more than complimentary about the efforts of his own team as they reach the end of a campaign waged in the face of adversity.
“I couldn’t have asked any more in terms of what the players have given. Wales can be very proud of these players and their performances and commitment, particularly to have come out of that group. You couldn’t have asked any more than what these players have given. They spent themselves ad emptied the tank.
“We knew that they [South Africa] had gone back to what made them successful, and we did a good job on that. They kept coming at us pretty hard with one off runners, and I thought we were outstanding in there. We were really unlucky at that [match-winning] scrum. I felt Bryan Habana was a little bit offside at that ruck where he’s caught Lloyd Williams and it wasn’t picked up, which was a little bit disappointing. Lloyd should [then] have gone in hard on the ball because the scrum has screwed a little bit, and potentially Alex [Cuthbert] should have stayed out. But it was a great bit of skill wasn’t it? You’ve got to acknowledge the skill.”