Junior Boks suffer shock loss to Italy at U-20 World Cup

The Junior Springboks suffered a shock 34-26 defeat to Italy at the World Rugby U-20 Championship in Paarl on Thursday afternoon.

Bafana Nhleko’s men were outplayed in atrocious conditions, which left one to wonder how any tournament could be arranged for the Western Cape in the middle of winter.

But be that as it may, the Italians were deserved winners, with their forwards delivering a master-class performance in the conditions, while the South Africans gave away too many penalties and made too many errors to be a threat over the 80 minutes.

Down early

Nhleko’s men had their moments, such as when centre Damian Markus ran all of 80 metres from out of his own 22m area and out-paced the defence and stepped his way to the tryline for a wonderful score.

But, the Junior Boks went behind early on and while they showed great fight and determination to get back into the game, first in the opening 40 minutes, and then later in the game, they left themselves with too much to do to win in the end.

Italy raced into a 17-0 lead inside 25 minutes after being awarded a penalty try and then a five-pointer after a forwards driving maul, before the Junior Boks finally scored through centre Katlego Letebele.

Minutes before half-time, replacement Jurenzo Julius scored, after fielding a cross-field kick out wide to leave the home team 12-17 down at the break.

Second half

Italy prop Marcos Gallorini then scored twice within six minutes of the restart after half-time to put his team 31-12 up before the South Africans again fought back, with tries by Markus and Juanne Else to leave the game finely balanced at 26-31 to the Italians with 20 minutes to play.

The South Africans couldn’t score again, but Italian replacement Giovanne Sante slotted a 76th minute penalty to secure a famous eight-point win.

The Junior Boks opened their campaign with a 33-23 win over Georgia last Saturday and next face Argentina at Athlone Stadium on Tuesday.