De Villiers backs Boks to hit back

South Africa coach Peter de Villiers has made two enforced changes for the second Tri Nations Test in Wellington on Saturday as his team look to make amends for their humbling loss to New Zealand.

De Villiers backs Boks to hit back

South Africa coach Peter de Villiers has made two enforced changes for the second Tri Nations Test in Wellington on Saturday as his team look to make amends for their humbling loss to New Zealand.

With lock Bakkies Botha banned for nine weeks for headbutting Jimmy Cowan in the opening minute of last Saturday’s 32-12 defeat and prop Jannie du Plessis ruled out with a calf injury, both Danie Rossouw and CJ van der Linde come into the pack.

Another change comes on the bench where loose forward Ryan Kankowski replaces the promoted Rossouw.

For the remainder of the starting XV there is a chance for them to redeem themselves after a poor performance at Eden Park.

De Villiers said: “I trust this bunch of people who are with me. They weren’t on song on Saturday but they weren’t bad, it’s just the All Blacks were very good.

“These boys are much better than what they showed on Saturday and it’s time for them to stand up.”

Springboks captain John Smit added: “When you’ve let yourself down and you’ve been beaten properly you’ve got to look back and go back to the basics and see what made you a good team and stick to that.

“It doesn’t go pear-shaped overnight but you’ve got to revisit the basics that have made you a good team and that’s what we’ve had to do.”

Smit is confident there will be nothing to compare with Botha’s foolish move this weekend at Westpac Stadium.

“Discipline will always be a factor every week and we said it after the game on Saturday. You don’t want to see incidents like (Botha’s). It’s disappointing for us as a team and it’s been dealt with and it’s been just reward for silly behaviour,” Smit said.

“You take a look at the game again and everywhere else we were pretty good. It was probably the least amount of penalties we’ve conceded in a Test match for quite some time.

“But the only thing you can remember is one act of silliness and I think the fact of the matter is in a team sport you can’t have too many big egos. If you have just one outside of the team ethos it hurts the team. Team ethic is what’s got to be amplified.”

Springboks team: Zane Kirchner; Jean de Villiers, Jaque Fourie, Wynand Olivier, Bryan Habana; Morne Steyn, Ricky Januarie; Gurthro Steenkamp, John Smit (captain), CJ van der Linde, Danie Rossouw, Victor Matfield, Schalk Burger, Francois Louw, Pierre Spies.

Replacements: Chiliboy Ralepelle, BJ Botha, Andries Bekker, Ryan Kankowski, Ruan Pienaar, Butch James, Gio Aplon.

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