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De Villiers` one bad moment

Friday 25th July 2008

Jean de Villiers: Still reflecting on the one missed tackle

South Africa centre Jean de Villiers is still thinking what might have been had he not slipped off a tackle on Stirling Mortlock during last week's 16-9 Tri-Nations defeat to Australia in Perth.

De Villiers, who has become one of the senior players in the team since namesake Peter took over as coach, said that his tackle was symptomatic of a missing edge he and his team-mates had at crucial moments last week.

"As a senior player myself, along with the other senior guys, we should take more responsibility and maybe we should have stood up more when things got tough in the Australian game," he said to the Cape Times on Friday.

"I definitely think that there were a lot of positives. The Tests against the All Blacks went very well, while it was good on attack against Australia.

"But I missed a tackle on Mortlock, which led to a try. That put almost a half dampener on my whole tour," he said.

"It made me feel really bad and brought a half-negative feeling to my outlook. It's something where I feel I disappointed myself, as well as my team-mates, in that situation.

"But one does make mistakes. You take 20 or 30 matches to build up a reputation, but then one bad lapse of concentration or whatever it was, then everything goes down again.

"So I do think that there were a lot of positives, but I want to be hard on myself and I am just sorry that one such lapse had such a major impact on the tour."

Could South Africa have won? Should they have won? One week before, the answer through the rugby world was a resounding 'yes' after the Boks had conquered the House of Pain in Dunedin for the first time ever. But all did not run so smoothly in Perth.

"There was a combination of problems," continued De Villiers, giving an honest appraisal of the performance.

"There was definitely a problem at the breakdown points, where the Wallabies were much better than we were. By saying that, I think it was a collective effort from the whole group who were not on the pace there.

"If we talk about having lost the game at the breakdown points, then every one of us must do his bit in each situation. At a ruck, we must clean out effectively. We definitely didn't do it. So we felt that we did let things slip there, while we also didn't use our chances.

"There were try-scoring opportunities and we didn't finish them off. At international level, you get very few opportunities, so you must make full use of them."

The defeat is not going to cost the team tournament momentum though, with a suitable return of hard yards having been won with the away victory in Dunedin.

"I think that you look at the tour as a success if you compare it to what we have done in the past," ruminated De Villiers.

"But it is disappointing that we couldn't win the last game as well. We didn't play very well against Australia, but yet we had a real chance of winning.

"But the win that we got in New Zealand was obviously fantastic. It is a big achievement for this group of players.

"The fact that Peter could get a win in New Zealand for the first time in ten years of the Boks going there must definitely be very pleasing for him. That is a fantastic achievement and it is great for him. Hopefully as a coaching team and players, we can go forward and build on that and just grow as a group.

"We definitely can win it. A lot will depend on what happens in the other games. But if we win our games at home, we should stand a good chance of winning the tournament.

"I think it would probably be best for us if Australia win this weekend, as we must still play them twice. So we will see what happens there and just do our bit at home."