New Zealand coach Ian Foster believes his side's record loss against South Africa on Friday will alleviate the pressure on his players ahead of the Rugby World Cup; "No one's going to rate us now which is quite nice. We'll just go and and get stuck in"
Saturday 26 August 2023 09:54, UK
New Zealand coach Ian Foster believes his side's record 35-7 defeat to South Africa on Friday will help his players by reducing expectations that the All Blacks will win a record fourth Rugby World Cup in France.
The All Blacks lost lock Scott Barrett in the first half at Twickenham, when he was dismissed for two yellow cards, and the Springboks entered the break with a 14-0 lead thanks to tries from skipper Siya Kolisi and Kurt-Lee Arendse.
Malcolm Marx, Bongi Mbonambi and Kwagga Smith also went over for tries in the second half to extend the world champions' advantage, with Cam Roigard scoring a late consolation for New Zealand.
"We know the circumstances we're in and the goal we're looking for," said Foster.
"You can't deny it wasn't a good performance from us. We've got a couple of weeks to get that right but I fully believe we can.
"That performance is going to take a lot of heat off us. No one is going to rate us now which is quite nice. We'll just prepare quietly and get stuck in."
Foster also provided key insight on how the Springboks derailed his team's plans.
"We lost the cohesion when we were put under pressure, but I thought our defence in the first 20 minutes was outstanding and if we had more discipline in key areas we could have counter-punched," added the 58-year-old.
"You couldn't help but be impressed with what they [South Africa] did, they really got stuck into us.
"Their physicality and their set-piece was superb and they had a massive game at scrum and line-out time - that was a big difference.
"They forced us into errors and that caused us problems."
New Zealand will travel to Germany to complete their World Cup preparations, with hooker Dane Coles calling on his team-mates to learn the lessons of the defeat during their final training camp.
"We got a punch but we just have to get up and go again and it starts tomorrow when we wake up and things will start falling into place, but the important thing is that you don't shy away from it," he said after the game.
"You feel like something really bad has happened, which it has, but the first thing is to digest it all and take the lessons and create a bit of ownership over the next two weeks.
"You just have to be really hard on yourself and the team and then we will come up with some solutions and that will be the driver for the team."
