The beating that the Springboks received from the All Blacks at Ellis Park in Johannesburg on Saturday not only puts Rassie Erasmus’ team under enormous pressure for the rest of the “Greatest Rivalry” tour, but it also cost the team’s supporters one of their most important bragging rights.

Rassie Erasmus’ team lost their number one position in the official World Rugby rankings after Dave Rennie’s All Blacks defeated them 33-16 at Ellis Park in Johannesburg. The New Zealand team scored five tries to the Springboks’ single try in the first half.

The Springboks were ranked as the world’s number one team for 21 months, starting in November 2024. After Saturday’s victory, the All Blacks now have 94.03 ranking points, while the Springboks have slipped to second place with 92.21 points.

However, Erasmus took the defeat on the chin and gave a realistic analysis of the course of the match when he spoke to the media after the action.

“We have been in many catastrophic situations in our lives. We lost the first Test against the British & Irish Lions [in 2021] and everyone said it was a catastrophe. We lost the first pool game against New Zealand in the World Cup [in 2019] and everyone said that was catastrophic, so we have been in a lot of catastrophic situations. We’re now in a position where if we want to win the series we have to win three games on the trot. So, without doubt, it puts them in a very good position which they thoroughly deserve,” said the Springbok coach.

According to Erasmus his team have to go to Cape Town and try and win there in the second test.

“If we do, it’s all level, but we still have to win three matches in a row. I wouldn’t say it’s catastrophic because there is a way out, and that’s winning three matches on the trot,” he remarked.

Erasmus said the Springboks contributed to their defeat by the number of errors they committed, induced by New Zealand’s excellence.

“We were thoroughly beaten by a team that is now number one in the world – it’ll be nice to go into the next game as the underdogs,” he joked.

After his team dominated the scrums in the first half, but were unable to gain any advantage from that, Erasmus identified this as a problem.

“I think we were dominant in the scrums, but it doesn’t help you if you’re dominant in one or two parts of the game. The All Blacks were more dominant in most parts of the game.  I’m not going to butter it up with that cliché and say we’re going to learn from this and get better. We didn’t need to learn from this. We knew what we had to do on the day – we didn’t do it,” he commented.

The tour continues when the All Blacks take on the Lions in Johannesburg on Tuesday in the final match against a franchise team before the second Test in Cape Town on Saturday.

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