The Springboks crushed a depleted Italy 66-7 in their Nations Championship November tour opener in Turin today (November 7), after scoring nine tries and conceding just the one, reports The Citizen.

The world champions enjoyed a superb first half, scoring tries at will, with their maul from the lineout especially strong. They were also clinical in their execution and strong in the set-pieces. They hardly made any errors and their discipline was top-notch.

Siya Kolisi’s team led 45-0 at the break. They scored six tries and dominated every aspect of the game and looked as if they could reach the 101-0 record score achieved against Italy in 1999.

The only area where the hosts were able to stand up to the Boks and match them was in the scrums. No team got the better of the other though in a 50/50 contest.

In the second half, the Boks’ dominant game fell somewhat apart because of all the changes made by coach Rassie Erasmus. Italy also upped their game and were far more competitive. The Boks just weren’t as clinical and knocked on regularly, lost balls and produced a messy 40-minute effort.

The Italians scored a try, while the Boks only managed to score three tries in a more evenly contested 40 minutes.

There were a number of strong performances by the Bok players, among them Ruan Nortje, Morne van den Berg, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, and Ethan Hooker.

The Boks lost Salmaan Moerat minutes before the kick-off, the lock is understood to have hurt his back in the warm-up. It is not known how serious the injury is.

The Boks next face France in Paris on Friday.

Teams

Italy – 15 Mirko Belloni, 14 Ange Capuozzo, 13 Paolo Odogwu, 12 Leonardo Marin, 11 Monty Ioane, 10 Paolo Garbisi, 9 Alessandro Fusco, 8 Lorenzo Cannone, 7 Samuele Locatelli, 6 Alessandro Ortombina, 5 Federico Ruzza, 4 Niccolò Cannone, 3 Simone Ferrari, 2 Giacomo Nicotera (c), 1 Muhamed Hasa.
Bench: 16 Tommaso Di Bartolomeo, 17 Danilo Fischetti, 18 Ion Neculai, 19 Enoch Opoku Gyamfi, 20 Ross Vintcent, 21 Manuel Zuliani, 22 Stephen Varney, 23 Tommaso Allan

Springboks – 15 Damian Willemse, 14 Kurt-Lee Arendse, 13 Jesse Kriel, 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Ethan Hooker, 10 Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, 9 Morné van den Berg, 8 Jasper Wiese, 7 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 6 Siya Kolisi (c), 5 Ruan Nortjé, 4 Salmaan Moerat, 3 Thomas du Toit, 2 Malcolm Marx, 1 Ox Nché.
Bench: 16 Jan-Hendrik Wessels, 17 Gerhard Steenekamp, 18 Wilco Louw, 19 Lood de Jager, 20 Cameron Hanekom, 21 Paul de Villiers, 22 Grant Williams, 23 Manie Libbok

Breaking news at your fingertips… Follow Caxton Network News on Facebook and join our WhatsApp channel.

Nuus wat saakmaak. Volg Caxton Netwerk-nuus op Facebook en sluit aan by ons WhatsApp-kanaal.