'Please don't see it as boasting': Rassie Erasmus on advantage over Dave Rennie's All Blacks

Springboks head coach Rassie Erasmus has assessed Dave Rennie’s All Blacks after taking a 2-1 advantage in the Greatest Rivalry series, stressing that the series is not over.

The coach was relieved and happy to have won the third Test which means that the Springboks can’t lose the series, only win or draw the series in the fourth Test.

When asked how this achievement felt, Erasmus was quick to correct the media on whether the series had been won

“They can draw it in Baltimore, and obviously we are happy tonight,” Erasmus said post-match. 

“Some people in the media, or even some people, said it out loud that this is the series, the part in South Africa, but it’s a four-Test series

“So I know they lost this part in South Africa, but it’s still three games. I know they smashed us in the first one, but I thought the score was a little bit skew.

“You know, we were a lot more in that game than I think most people think. And then last weekend, in the last play, they could have drawn it.”

Erasmus explained the one advantage that the Springboks have over the All Blacks is experience and familiarity with tough times that they can fall back on.

He said Rennie doesn’t have the “luxury” of continuity yet as they are in team-building mode in the first year of his tenure.

“I think the one advantage that we do have, Dave has only coached them, was it eight games or nine games? I’m not sure. I mean, they have two losses now, but they came in with a 100 per cent win the record, and they’re playing a style that is tough to defend,” Erasmus said post-match. 

“But please don’t see this as boasting, but we’ve been together since 2018, and and I don’t know if we’ve ever in the last two years, since the World Cup, selected a team with continuity, and our plan was always to give a lot of guys chance with an eye on the World Cup. But then, when we get into this kind of rivalry series, start and build some momentum in continuity.

“They don’t have the luxury yet because he’s building a team, and I know what that feels like in 2018 when I got the team 18 months before World Cup.

“You just at the right moments, must get some momentum. But I know these players inside out; they know me.”

Erasmus said that arriving at the stadium was an emotional day for himself as the team wanted to deliver for South Africa.

“I was unbelievably emotional today because I wanted us to come to Soweto and take it to the [South African] people, and then I thought, oh, when we got here, they don’t have the money to come into the stadium, and then we had a chat about that,” he said. 

“So they know when not to take me serious and when to take me serious, and we’ve got the luxury of knowing each other for nine years through tough times, and not to say that we’ve always got to win because of that, but we may be just a little bit more used to that.”