Rassie Erasmus apologizes in front of the public and provides commentary on referee O’Keeffe.
Rassie Erasmus, the director of rugby for the Springboks, issued a public apology via Twitter following South Africa’s 13-8 loss to Ireland.
The Springboks entered the highly anticipated matchup with the top-ranked team in the world riding a six-game winning streak, so expectations were high.
But in a gladiatorial battle where defense held each team to a single try, the defending champions came up short.
Flyhalf Mannie Libbok missed a conversion and a penalty, while scrumhalf Faf de Klerk missed two long-range attempts inside his own half.
When South Africa’s final maul attempt failed, Ireland held onto a 13-8 lead thanks to six points in the second half on two scrum penalties.
In addition to congratulating Ireland on their victory, Erasmus apologized publicly to South Africa and vowed to “work harder and make you proud.”.
Also commenting on referee Ben O’Keeffe, the former head coach said that it was “nice to be involved in a game so intense and physical without the referee getting too much involved!”.
“Congratulations, Ben and your team.
“.
After defeating Scotland in the first week, South Africa is still in a good position to advance to the quarterfinals.
They play Tonga in their final game, but are already qualified barring a miraculous turn of events for Scotland, who must defeat Ireland handily to prevent them from earning any losing bonus points and beat Tonga and Romania to earn bonus points.
South Africa would face the winner of Pool A, France, in the quarterfinal, which would take place at the Stade de France in Paris.
The Springboks team is still confident that they can repeat their World Cup-winning performance from 2019, when they lost a pool game to New Zealand but went on to win the tournament.
Yes, we still have a chance to prevail in the match.
It goes without saying that you must (believe).
Head coach Jacques Nienaber declared, “We’re in this game to win it.
We can definitely still win it because teams that drop a game in the pool stages have to work hard to advance.
We had a chance to win in the 79th minute of our game against the top team in the world, but we lost by five points.
“.