Springboks now eye unbeaten tour after stunning France

The Springboks will now be eyeing on unbeaten tour of the northern hemisphere, after stunningly downing France 32-17 at the Stade de France in Paris on Saturday, in what was widely regarded to be their toughest match of the year.

Italy in Turin, Ireland in Dublin and Wales in Cardiff are still to come, following their win against Japan in London nine days ago, so there is still work to do, but the side will take plenty of confidence from their incredible showing in Saint Denis.

Leading up to the game the talk was all about French revenge, with this the first meeting between the teams since the Boks dumped the hosts out of the World Cup in 2023, while Siya Kolisi’s 100^th game added gravitas to the occasion.

A 14-13 halftime deficit and a permanent red card to Lood de Jager on the stroke of the break made it seem like an impossible task in the Stade de France, but as they had already done this season, against the All Blacks in Wellington and Argentina in Durban, the Boks unleashed in the final 20 minutes.

Having weathered the early second half storm and kept themselves in the match, trailing by four going into the final quarter, they made merry against the tiring hosts as Andre Esterhuizen dotted down from a maul, Grant Williams sniped over and Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu powered in at the death.

Wanted to win

“We desperately wanted to win this game. I know France are ranked fifth in the world and people will say you’re ranked No 1 so you should beat the team ranked fifth,” said Erasmus after the game.

“Playing here, the atmosphere, I think the French can be so proud of their supporters and for us it was intimidating, but luckily we’d been through this in 2018 or 2019, 2022 and again in 2023, so the experience of the players showed at half time.

“There was definitely not calmness, but we had to make plans. Mostly the assistant coaches and the players (had to step up), and unfortunately some guys had to sacrifice (like Kolisi being subbed due to the red to De Jager), so credit to the whole group.”

The Boks now turn their focus to Italy, who will be fired up for the encounter after they produced an upset by beating Australia 26-19 at the weekend, and it will be interesting to see who Erasmus picks this week.

Talk is that Handre Pollard will perhaps start at 10, that Ethan Hooker could get a go at 12, with Canan Moodie outside him, while Ben-Jason Dixon could also get a game.

Erasmus though will have to think carefully about his selection as the Boks will want to also take momentum into next week’s clash with Ireland.