South Africa beat Portugal 64-21 in historic Test

The Springboks beat Portugal 64-21 in a one-off, historic Test in Bloemfontein on Saturday, in their final match before the Rugby Championship, which starts early next month.

It was the first time the Boks and Portuguese clashed in a rugby Test match.

The world champions were led by lock Salmaan Moerat, with the Boks scoring 10 tries to the three by Portugal.

The match was played in front of a capacity 42,000 crowd where Portugal played their part in testing the Boks with their quick passing and speedy backs. They scored the first try of the match and later added two more tries, but the Boks over-powered their opponents from Europe.

Several Bok players stood out, among them wingers Kurt-Lee Arendse, who scored a try, and Makazole Mapimpi, who scored three tries.

Unfortunately the Boks lost centre Andre Esterhuizen to a red card in the first minute of the match and were twice reduced to playing with 13 men when Arendse and then Quan Horn were yellow carded.

Overall, it was a strong showing by the Boks’ new-look team, which was vastly different from the side that drew 1-1 with Ireland in the last fortnight. Here is how The Citizen reported on the Test.

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The Bok team had seven uncapped players in the matchday-23, while there were also a further seven players who had 10 caps or less.

Several players in the Portugal side featured at last year’s World Cup, when the “Wolves” shocked the world by beating Fiji in a pool game. They also drew with Georgia.

Teams

South Africa: Aphelele Fassi; Kurt-Lee Arendse, Lukhanyo Am, Andre Esterhuizen, Makazole Mapimpi; Manie Libbok, Cobus Reinach; Evan Roos, Ben-Jason Dixon, Phepsi Buthelezi; RG Snyman, Salmaan Moerat (capt); Thomas du Toit, Johan Grobbelaar, Jan-Hendrik Wessels. Bench: Andre-Hugo Venter, Ntuthuko Mchunu, Trevor Nyakane, Ruan Venter, Elrigh Louw, Morne van den Berg, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Quan Horn

Portugal: Simao Bento; Manuel Cardoso Pinto, Jose Lima, Tomas Appleton (capt), Rodrigo Marta; Joris Moura, Hugo Camacho; Vasco Baptista, Diego Pinheiro, Jose Maderia; Duarte Torgal, Nicolas Fernandes; Diogo Hasse Ferreira, Luka Begic, Francisco Fernandes. Bench: David Costa, Pedro Vicente, Abel Cunha, Antonio Rebelo Andrade, Andre Cunha, Pedro Lucas, Domingos Cabral, Jose Paiva dos Santos