RUGBY NEWS - There was lots to be positive about for the Springboks in their final Castle Lager Rugby Championship engagement of the season, but perhaps the biggest positive came by way of a negative.
While the South Africans emphatically answered the post-Albany question about whether there was really as big as a 57 point difference between the teams, the fact that they had made up 56 of those points on their home ground was not providing reason for them to celebrate after a Newlands clash with the All Blacks that will go down as one of the great test matches.
Siya Kolisi was joined at the post-match press conference top table by Steven Kitshoff and Pieter-Steph du Toit, and while both of them had produced special performances in what for them were new roles, the disappointment of losing was evident.
Kitshoff spoke about how gutting it was to put so much on the line and yet fall so tantalisingly short, and the solemn Du Toit was in full agreement.
It mirrored the attitude of captain Eben Etzebeth after the draw in Perth earlier in the competition.
The Boks don’t often get parity in Australia, and they might have been forgiven for celebrating the draw.
But there was none of that.
The Boks want to be winners, they want to be No 1, and Etzebeth made that clear and with their words he was followed by some of his players at the weekend.
No1 suddenly doesn’t seem the laughable prospect it would have appeared just a few days ago, but perhaps there might be one small silver lining in the fact that the Boks did not get over the line for the win that would have been quite deserved had it happened in the Newlands cauldron.
At least it means that the Boks and their supporters will remain grounded and thus lessen the chances of a repeat of 2014, when the Boks won against the All Blacks in Johannesburg and then faltered on their end of year tour.
