The Springboks are determined to lift all aspects of their game in their second Test against Italy at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Gqeberha on Saturday.

This follows an underwhelming 42-24 first Test win over a weakened Italian outfit at Loftus over the past weekend, with Bok coaches and players admitting their frustration after a below-par performance, The Citizen reports.

Prop Thomas du Toit addressed the media at yesterday’s press conference and said that while the performance was not a wake-up call, the team were well aware of the high standards expected of them.

“I wouldn’t say it was a wake-up call as such, we just set very high standards for ourselves, both in preparing for a match and in the match itself, as well as in training,” said Du Toit.

“We are always trying to lift ourselves; we compare ourselves to ourselves, meaning we drive ourselves to be better than we were the week before. What went wrong is a difficult question to answer.

“It is just that we want to be better every week and this time we weren’t better. Today (in their review session) we saw the mistakes and now know why we disappointed ourselves. So now we will be working this week on fixing that.”

Respect for Italy

With Italy having left star and experienced players at home and dealing with injury disruptions, they remain heavy underdogs. However, Du Toit reiterated the Springboks’ respect for their opponents.

“As we’ve been saying all of last week, we respect them and their patriotism for their country, as that’s something that resonates with us. There is a good alignment in their squad, and they are gelling well as a unit,” he said.

“So there are definitely areas we need to improve on this week, while we also have to build on the areas of our game which went fairly well.”

One of Italy’s highlights in the first Test was their impressive maul try from a lineout, which drove 20m over the line. Du Toit admitted this was a sore point for the team and something they were determined to address.

“If you look at that maul it was an example of what is becoming the modern way of mauling in that it is not the whole package, but different players coming in to have an involvement,” he said.

“It was a case of the maul snaking left and right and kind of evolving towards the tryline. We do pride ourselves on our ability to stop the maul, so it was a big negative for us. We are not ducking that and we addressed it this morning.”