South Africa 24 Ireland 25
Feral in nature, gladiatorial in bloodletting, riveting as a spectacle, the second Test lived up to its prematch billing, enthralling from the first collision to the exclamation mark of Ciarán Frawley’s right boot that closed the chapter on a brilliant two Test series. Honours even.
South Africa prevailed in Pretoria and, as the hooter sounded in Durban, they looked like doubling down – until replacement scrumhalf Caolin Blade invited Frawley to confront destiny head-on, ushering him in to a pocket of space behind a ruck and whipping a pass in his direction.
An impure strike, certainly, compared to the drop goal he landed 11 minutes earlier, but directionally sound, covering the 42 metres with ease and securing the win for Ireland. Frawley admitted: “The strike was probably the ugliest drop goal I’ve ever hit in my life.
“The one in Tottenham” – a reference to the one he missed to win the Champions Cup final against Toulouse in normal time – “was way better, which is funny. It worked out, which is key. Bladey pulled the trigger at the right time.
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“They were probably expecting us to pick and go a little bit more and get better field position. I felt there was no pressure on me when I went for the drop goal.”
The last sentiment is an insight into his mindset. He’d earlier put a cross-kick out on the full, but it didn’t inhibit him one iota, evidenced in the grubber kick-through that provided the launch pad for Ireland’s game-winning sequence.
It was a brilliant Ireland win, built on guts, character, belief, grit, determination and an indomitable will. Andy Farrell’s team have been cursed with some heartbreaking losses and this looked to take on the appearance of another one of those occasions until Frawley’s heroics.
[ South Africa 24 Ireland 25: How the players rated in DurbanOpens in new window ]
The visitors had been courageous, played some cracking rugby, dredged up and expended every scintilla of energy, and yet it didn’t look like it would suffice; Ireland were staring at death by a thousand cuts – or eight penalties from the boot of South African outhalf Handré Pollard’s metronomic placekicking.
Ireland were mired in a rut of ill-discipline, especially in the third quarter, when they merited large-scale punishment, but only the match officials will be able to explain on review how they came up with several decisions. On another occasion, had Ireland lost the game, it would have been unpalatable and tormented them for a year and a day. But thankfully that was not to be their fate.
Fullback Jamie Osborne, winning just his second cap, had a stunning game. Rónan Kelleher was arguably Ireland’s best player, while Andrew Porter and Tadhg Furlong never shirked a carry or a tackle. Springbok loose head prop Ox Nche won the official man-of-the-match award for his work in a dominant scrum that squeezed out a handful of penalties.
Ireland extracted a modicum of revenge in the lineout, James Ryan, excellent in his all-round game, filching three; it was a huge improvement on the passivity of last week. The visitors attacked their hosts in every contact point, tackle, and breakdown too.
James Lowe’s interventions were timely, Robbie Henshaw, Tadhg Beirne and Joe McCarthy put in an astonishing physical effort, so too did Josh van der Flier, while captain Caelan Doris, despite a yellow card, had another stunning game.
Conor Murray and Jack Crowley put Ireland in some good field positions and varied the game, Calvin Nash offered while Garry Ringrose’s marshalling of the outside defence was hugely important. And the bench, Blade and Frawley, masterminding the chase, part of a supporting cast that added energy and quality in that fraught endgame.
It was in marked contrast to the first half as Ireland thundered into the collisions with a ferocity as if they wanted to expunge the memories of last week’s opening quarter in Pretoria. The Springboks were rattled and for a time, bloodied, losing Willie le Roux, Franco Mostert and, for a 10-minute repair, Eben Etzebeth.
The visitors led 16-6 at the interval, the try a variation on last week’s training ground beauty. Osborne made the break, Henshaw flicked a pass to the supporting Murray, with the scrumhalf dotting down. It could and should have been a bigger margin, but Ringrose was unlucky to lose his footing in sight of the try-line.
Within 16 minutes of the restart, the Springboks had surged into the lead, four Pollard penalties the byproduct of scrum and breakdown pressure. Ireland lost Doris to a yellow card for a croc roll compounded by Ryan’s attempted clear-out. The off-field review was yellow.
Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu caused Ireland problems all game long, so too Cheslin Kolbe and Kurt-Lee Arendse but the visitors’ scramble defence kept their line intact. So too the sheer aggression of their goal line and maul defence.
Crowley kicked a penalty to put Ireland 19-18 in front, Pollard landed two more to push the home side into what looked like a decisive 24-19 advantage, but Ireland kept coming, kept playing. Doris was held up over the line following another sweeping counterattack, but from the goal line drop-out Frawley dropped the sweetest of goals on 69 minutes.
Osborne brought off a great tackle on Kolbe before Ireland mustered one last prolonged assault. Forwards and backs worked symbiotically to engineer the position, but it was no mere bagatelle when Frawley dropped back in the pocket. Cue pandemonium.
Scoring sequence – 5 mins: Crowley penalty, 0-3; 13: Murray try, Crowley conversion, 0-10; 17: Pollard penalty, 3-10; 34: Pollard penalty, 6-10; 36: Crowley penalty, 6-13; 40 (+1): Crowley penalty, 6-16. Halftime: 6-16. 44: Pollard penalty, 9-16; 47: Pollard penalty, 12-16; 52: Pollard penalty, 15-16; 56: Pollard penalty, 18-16; 58: Crowley penalty, 18-19; 60: Pollard penalty, 21-19; 64: Pollard penalty, 24-19; 69: Frawley drop goal, 24-22; 80: Frawley drop goal, 24-25.
SOUTH AFRICA: W le Roux (Bulls); C Kolbe (Suntory Sungoliath), J Kriel (Canon Eagles), D de Allende (Wild Knights), K-L Arendse (Bulls); H Pollard (Leicester Tigers), F de Klerk (Canon Eagles); O Nche (Sharks), B Mbonambi (Sharks), F Malherbe (Stormers); E Etzebeth (Sharks), F Mostert (Honda Heat); S Kolisi (Racing 92, capt), P-S du Toit (Toyota Verblitz), K Smith (Shizuoka Blue Revs). Replacements: S Feinberg-Mngomezulu (Stormers) for le Roux (HIA) (2 mins), RG Snyman (Leinster) for Etzebeth (blood) (6-16 mins), Snyman for Mostert (16 mins), G Williams (Sharks) for de Klerk (44 mins), M Marx (Kubota Spears) for Mbonambi (45 mins), V Koch (Sharks) for Malherbe (45 mins), M van Staden (Bulls) for Kolisi (50 mins), G Steenekamp (Bulls) for Nche (57 mins), S Moerat (Stormers) for Etzebeth (71-74 mins).
IRELAND: J Osborne (Leinster); C Nash (Munster), G Ringrose (Leinster), R Henshaw (Leinster), J Lowe (Leinster); J Crowley (Munster), C Murray (Munster); A Porter (Leinster), D Sheehan (Leinster), T Furlong (Leinster); J McCarthy (Leinster), J Ryan (Leinster); T Beirne (Munster), J Van der Flier (Leinster), C Doris (Leinster, capt). Replacements: F Bealham (Connacht) for Furlong (44 mins), C Healy (Leinster) for Porter (57 mins), R Baird (Leinster) for Ryan (57 mins), P O’Mahony (Munster) for Van der Flier (57 mins), C Blade (Connacht) for Murray (58 mins), C Frawley (Leinster) for Crowley (58 mins), R Herring (Ulster) for Kelleher (64 mins), S McCloskey (Ulster) for Nash (66 mins).
Yellow card: C Doris (Ireland) (47 mins).
Referee: K Dickson (England)
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