England 13-27 South Africa
by David Nicholson
at Twickenham

A DIRE England were outclassed and physically dominated by South Africa as they lost at home to the world champions.

The Springboks outmuscled the home side and when they attacked were fleet of thought and feet in stark contrast to the men in white.

The visitors’ first try was a blur as full-back Willie Le Roux claimed the ball kicked at him, dodged the English chase and then set loose Kurt-Lee Arendse, who sped through flailing English defenders for the opening try in the 30th minute.

Unlike last week’s comeback against the All Blacks, this was a wholly ineffectual performance, even when the visitors were reduced to 14 men for the last 20 minutes.

England centre Manu Tuilagi was honest after the game when he admitted that England made mistakes: “It was a tough game and they put pressure on us and forced us to make mistakes.”

But England knew from the rugby world cup final that the visiting forward pack would attack the set pieces and they also dominated the scrums at will.

England captain Owen Farrell was typically forthright after the match when he said a lack of accuracy cost his side and “we have not finished our autumn well.”

South Africa were clever and, when faced with an obdurate defence, fired over two drop goals to keep the scoreboard ticking over. But when the opportunity presented itself, the ‘Boks were fast and accurate and tore the English defence apart.

In contrast, England were ponderous and had no attacking elan, and had no speedsters to trouble the Springbok defence — when attacking, they continually made handling errors and handed the initiative back to the visitors.

A seemingly complacent head coach Eddie Jones said he was not worried by three losses out of four games, even after he billed the autumn internationals a mini-world cup.

“We did not play well, and that is my fault. We tried a few things early on that did not work well and we seemed to drop off.

“It is hard to get in the game when you lose your scrum and set pieces.”

The Springboks will take heart from this autumn campaign just one year out from defending their title. England, on the other hand, have a team that has lost their way and a coach who does not seem able to get the best out of his side, unlike France and Ireland.

But Saturday’s announcement of the death of former Scotland international Doddie Weir, who died aged 52 after being diagnosed with motor neurone disease six years ago, put the result of a game of rugby into its proper perspective.