Springboks preparing for typical Welsh arm-wrestle in Cardiff

The Springboks are preparing themselves for a typically tough match when they take on Wales in their Rugby World Cup warm-up match at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on Saturday afternoon.

Although the Boks have enjoyed a good recent record over the hosts, winning four of their last five games including a 2-1 home series win last year, their record in Cardiff is not as good after winning just once in their last five appearances there.

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Their games are also usually close affairs, with only the Boks’ strong 30-14 win over Wales in Cape Town last year a standout, while the four games before that were all decided by winning margins of five points or less.

Bok assistant coach Daan Human believes they are in for a similar challenge this weekend.

“It’s going to be an arm-wrestle of a match against them. They have won four of their last five matches against us in Wales and they’ll use that as motivation,” explained Human.

“In the 2019 World Cup semi-final we had to rely on a last-minute penalty to beat them, so we know what we are in for.

“They are well coached, they can take you to the gutters, and they come off a tough training camp, so we really need to pitch up and perform well if we want to get a positive result here.”

Confident Wales

Wales head into the game against the Springboks with plenty of confidence after strong performances in their past two matches against England, beating them 20-9 in Cardiff before following that up by allowing the hosts to sneak away with a 19-17 win at Twickenham last week.

Although times have been tough for the Welsh recently, they will take a lot of heart from those two results and try to put pressure on the Boks this weekend.

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“We have been impressed with the whole Welsh team’s performance (over the past two weeks). Last weekend they had a good win over England and this past weekend they almost got another win,” said Human.

“We know they are a team coached by Warren Gatland, which means they are a tough team to play and are always well prepared. So we aren’t focusing on any players of theirs but their team as a whole.

“From our perspective, we’d like to be more effective within our systems and the way we do things, and that’s our focus this weekend.”