Ireland 13 South Africa 24
The whiff of cordite in the air was both apt and never went away on one of the most incendiary evenings a throbbing Aviva Stadium has ever witnessed. Pulsating, absorbing and at times farcical, what’s more, rarely has a game here provoked such a wide range of emotions, nor such a wide range of verdicts.
On one hand, this was a statement win by the double world champions that confirmed their status as the world’s best side. It was founded on their destruction of an Irish scrum, which suffered its most damaging day since the carnage of Twickenham in 2012.
On that day England scored 27 points directly or indirectly from their scrum supremacy in a 30-9 win. Here, South Africa’s scrum dominance led to a penalty try, yellow cards for both Andrew Porter and Paddy McCarthy, and two smartly taken tries by halfbacks Cobus Reinach and Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu off scrum penalty advantages.
It also contributed to six of the penalties in referee Matthew Carley’s whopping 18-13 penalty count, as Ireland conceded five yellow cards, one of which was upgraded to a 20-minute red for James Ryan.
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Mistakes also undermined Ireland’s efforts, such as successive kicks out on the full by Sam Prendergast and Tommy O’Brien, and twice failing to deal with the admittedly steepling restarts of Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
Yet, considering all that, despite briefly being reduced to 12 men at the start of the second half, to 13 players for another 20 minutes and 14 for another 24 minutes in total, Ireland’s defiance was heroic. They withstood sieges and won turnovers on their own line through replacements McCarthy, Cian Prendergast and Finlay Bealham, as well as some Houdini-esque acts of escapism and covering by Jack Crowley. In the process, they earned the gratitude of crowd and Andy Farrell alike. No one could say they didn’t dig deep.
The Boks are very good at generating supremacy and milking penalties at scrum time, but as against Argentina when earning seven scrum penalties in a 29-27 win, despite Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s X-factor and pace out wide, they’re not especially adept at translating this into points.
Indeed, almost preposterously, Ireland won the second half 6-5 and even butchered a hard-earned chance of a 76th-minute try which would have set up a grandstand finish. Ireland could have been thrashed.
Ireland actually started very brightly before the Boks used their well-oiled lineout and maul as a launching pad for the acrobatic fourth-minute finish by Damian Willemse. Wound up though the Boks were, his churlish finger-to-the-ear gesture to the crowd wasn’t necessary, nor his mouthing at them after Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s subsequent 47th-minute try.
The home response was arguably their best attack of the match, Mack Hansen and James Lowe linking on the left before Hansen hit O’Brien on the right edge.
Whereupon Carley and his assistants were culpable for possibly the worst decision of the entire month when ridiculously concluding that Feinberg-Mngomezulu merely be penalised, without any further punishment, for his no-arms, shoulder directly to O’Brien’s jaw in the sixth minute. It infuriated the crowd and amid the flurry of Irish yellow cards, discoloured the rest of the match.
TMO Andrew Jackson hastily decreed that “most of the force was into the chest” and “there is slight head contact”. Wrong on both counts ‘Jacko’. One of Carley’s assistants appeared to think that Feinberg-Mngomezulu didn’t have the time to bring his arm up.
Carley, who seemed far more perturbed about the ensuing shoving and jersey tugging than Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s actual high hit, said “we’re not convinced that it is a no-arms tackle” and so only awarded a penalty. Wrong again. Feinberg-Mngomezulu’s right arm is dead straight and parallel with his body when his right shoulder makes contact directly with O’Brien’s head.
Perhaps, in accordance with the Zombie anthem, Rassie Erasmus was indeed inside Carley’s head and the Springboks’ public complaints of unfair treatment arising from successive red cards for Lood de Jager against France and Franco Mostert against Italy succeeded.
On Monday, the Boks sought to set the week’s narrative when assistant coach Mzwandile Stick said: “Are we treated fairly? I don’t think so.” That seemed to resonate even more coming from Stick than Erasmus. No doubt Springboks’ supporters and others will hail this as more evidence of Erasmus’s genius. And maybe so. Innovative and charismatic, their head coach perhaps achieved here what he has long sought, not just a win over Ireland in Dublin, but also a separate set of rules for his team.
It will be interesting to see if World Rugby dare incur the wrath of Rassie by citing Feinberg-Mngomezulu, but most likely the team of English officials will not be undermined and there will be no repercussions to this latest officiating muck-up.
So it was that Dan Jones, the Foul Play Review Officer who wrongly upgraded Tadhg Beirne’s yellow card to red in Soldier Field, had the same role here. But this time, there could be no real complaints about Ryan’s yellow card being upgraded to a 20-minute red for catching Malcolm Marx on the head with a clearout.
It was the game’s seminal moment, for after Lowe had regathered the rebound from Sam Prendergast’s penalty off the upright, it also ruled out Beirne’s finish two phases later. So instead of Sam Prendergast having a close-range conversion to put Ireland in front, the Boks remained 5-0 ahead and Ireland were reduced to 14 players for 20 minutes.
That became 13 players after Reinach’s try and harsh yellow card against Sam Prendergast for offside as the pedantic Carley took centre stage. Again Ireland embraced the adversity, brilliantly conjuring a try off Ryan Baird’s one-handed lineout take and big carries.
This followed Pieter-Steph du Toit conceding a penalty, but no more, for cynically playing the scrumhalf, in this case Garry Ringrose. But when Crowley ill-advisedly did similar moments later, he was binned. As a costly consequence, instead of going in 12-7 and two men down, more scrum pressure saw Porter see yellow and Ireland trail 19-7 after a penalty try.
After the madcap second period ended with the Boks having to hold out, Erasmus gestured to the crowd with what seemed a sarcastic smile and thumbs up at the full-time whistle. He looked happily content yet one sensed he was also a little frustrated by the failure of his boys, whose endurance and stamina over 80 minutes has been unrivalled lately, to make an even bigger statement.
SCORING SEQUENCE – 3 mins: Willemse try, 0-5; 33: Reinach try, Feinberg-Mngomezulu con, 0-12; 36: Sheehan try, Crowley con, 7-12; 40: penalty try, 7-19; Half-time 7-19; 43: Prendergast pen, 10-19; 47: Feinberg-Mngomezulu try, 10-24; 55: Prendergast pen, 13-24
IRELAND: M Hansen; T O’Brien, G Ringrose, B Aki, J Lowe; S Prendergast, J Gibson-Park; A Porter, D Sheehan, T Furlong; J Ryan, T Beirne; R Baird, J van der Flier, C Doris (capt).
Replacements: J Crowley for O’Brien (HIA, 31 mins), P McCarthy for Van der Flier (43-49), R Kelleher for Sheehan (55), McCarthy for Porter, F Bealham for Furlong, J Conan for Baird (all 60), Porter for Van der Flier (62-72), T Farrell for Hansen (64), C Casey for Ringrose (72).
Yellow cards: Prendergast (33 mins), Crowley (39), Porter (42), McCarthy (62),
20-minute red card: Ryan (19 mins).
SOUTH AFRICA: D Willemse; C Moodie, J Kriel, D de Allende, C Kolbe; S Feinberg-Mngomezulu, C Reinach; B Venter, M Marx, T du Toit; E Etzebeth, R Nortje; S Kolisi (capt), PS du Toit, J Wiese.
Replacements: G Steenekamp for Venter (41 mins), W Louw for du Toit (41-72), RG Snyman for Etzebeth (49), K Smith for Wiese (52), A Esterhuizen for Kolisi, M Libbok for Feinberg-Mngomezulu (both 58), J Grobbelaar for Marx (65-72), G William for Reinach (67).
Yellow card: Williams (78 mins).
Referee: M Carley (Eng).
