Boks defeat like a wake-up call, says Kitshoff

Springboks prop Steven Kitshoff says their 35-20 defeat to the All Blacks in the Rugby Championship on Saturday at Mount Smart Stadium in Auckland feels like a wake-up call.

A rather sluggish start to the match saw the All Blacks race to a 17-0 lead in the opening 15 minutes. The Boks were under the pump and at halftime were 20-3 down, with their only points coming from a Faf de Klerk penalty.

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From there on it seemed as if the game was lost until there was a swing of momentum in the second stanza thanks to the Boks’ Bomb Squad. Tries from Malcolm Marx, Cheslin Kolbe, and Kwagga Smith sparked thoughts of a comeback but the game was buried beyond reasonable doubt by tries by All Blacks stars Will Jordan and Richie Mo’unga.

After the dominant 43-12 win over Australia in Pretoria the week before, the Boks were expected to build momentum but were instead given a wake-up call ahead of the Rugby World Cup in France later this year.

‘Wake-up call’

“It always feels like when you lose a game it’s a wake-up call,” said Kitshoff when speaking to the media after the match.

“For us, we‘re trying to play a certain style, a certain brand that we worked on the whole pre-season in Pretoria. I think if we could control those early tries and didn’t make as many unnecessary errors, I think it would have been a different game.

“Yes, it is a bit of a wake-up call, we understand Australia was a tough match but went away because of altitude but we knew coming to New Zealand, playing a strong All Blacks team, it was going to be a tough one,” he said.

Slow start

After a crushing defeat like the one the Boks experienced, it often feels as if it’s all doom and gloom. However, the match has provided perspective lessons with the most important one being they can’t afford a slow start against top-ranked teams.

“There’s a lot of learnings from this game,” Kitshoff said.

“I think something for us to look at is getting a better start and making sure we don’t go so far behind that it’s almost impossible to play catch-up rugby. For us, it’s looking at our structures and making sure we get ourselves in place and making sure we get a good start especially when it comes to the top five teams in the world.

“Team structures are so good defensively, attack-wise, and set-piece, you can’t afford to go 20 odd points and expect to fight your way back,” he said.

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