Another facile win for tourists

South Africa's second string cruised through their latest tour match as they outclassed the Edinburgh Reivers in a seven-try exhibition at Easter Road last night.

Several of the Springbok dirt-trackers gave coach Nick Mallett further food for thought before Saturday's Test at Murrayfield, notably captain Bobby Skinstad in an all-action first-half show.

Braam van Straaten converted all seven tries from seven different scorers, while all the Reivers had to show for their efforts was a penalty in first-half stoppage time from Scott Welsh.

The world champions, who racked up 10 tries in their opening match against the Glasgow Caledonians last week, had barely three minutes to wait before opening their account. A well worked rolling maul inside the Reivers 22 allowed giant prop Toks van der Linde to bundle his way over.

Breyton Paulse, the lightning quick winger who switched to fullback for this match after a hat-trick of tries in Glasgow, was keen to test the home defence at every opportunity - but an avalanche was averted early on as Welsh's assured kicking helped the Scots to hold their own.

But Skinstad - a ubiquitous presence before he retired at halftime - took a captain's lead to break a couple of tackles in midfield before sending flanker Andre Vos racing clear to the line. The Western Province star then claimed the third try himself, centre Robbie Fleck breeching the defence before releasing the number eight.

South Africa were clearly intent on imposing their superiority after the resumption as Ollie Le Roux and Willie Meyer both crashed over from close range.

A flurry of substitutions from both sides then disrupted the tourists' momentum until flanker Corne Krige emerged from a raft of players under the posts to claim the sixth try before Lourens Venter marked his entrance with the seventh on the final whistle.

Scorers: Edinburgh Reivers: Welsh penalty;

South Africa: Krige, Le Roux, Meyer, Skinstad, L Venter, Vos, van der Linde try each, B van Straaten 7 coversions.

Edinburgh Reivers: Lang, Gilmour, Hastings, Fairley, Kerr, Welsh, Burns, McNulty, Scott, Stewart, Burns, Fullarton, Roxburgh, Sinclair, Renwick. Replacements: Common, Nichol, Ross, Hogg, McVie, Wright, Hay.

South Africa: van Straaten, Kayser, Stewart, Alcock, van der Linde, Nkumane, Meyer, Boome, Smit, Krige, Vos, Skinstad. Replacements: du Toit, Venter, Swanepoel, Trystman, Le Roux, Drotske.

Referee : M Whyte (Ireland).