Nick Mallett's 'absolutely perfect' verdict on the Springboks despite 'question mark' ahead of France showdown

Nick Mallett insisted that the Springboks could not have produced a better first-half performance in their victory over Italy.

South Africa hammered the Azzurri 66-7 in the Nations Championship on Saturday and it was set up by their display in the opening period.

They utterly dominated the injury-stricken hosts and went at over a point a minute by taking a 45-0 advantage into the interval.

Italy barely had the ball as the Boks touched down six times through Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Morne van den Berg, Malcolm Marx (twice), Siya Kolisi and Damian Willemse.

‘Very, very impressive’ first half by the Springboks

“They (Italy) came up against the best team in the world playing a style of rugby that was absolutely perfect – they hardly made an error in that first half,” Mallett said on the Talking Boks podcast.

“I think they maybe gave away one penalty and there was one knock-on in 40 minutes, it was a perfect performance and they put Italy under so much pressure that Italy were conceding penalties.

“We were then able to transfer that to territory gains into their 22 and their defence of our maul was pretty flimsy, so it was a very, very impressive first 40 minutes.

“It was incredibly devastating for that Italian side who had built up the team saying that they have strength in depth. It was something I didn’t agree with.

“They don’t have enough rugby players to have four or five players that are international class at centre, so when you lose a [Tommaso] Menoncello and [Nacho] Brex, or you lose a top lineout forward like [Andrea] Zambonin or their captain [Michele Lamaro], it’s not something they can replace that easily.

“Sacha [Feinberg-Mngomezulu] was really outstanding and stuck to the game plan, no matter how many points we got ahead. They talk about enforcing our game plan on them and it was interesting hearing Morne van den Berg talk about that after the game.”

Although the second period was quite as impressive, with the Boks touching down three more times via Wilco Louw, Paul de Villiers and Ethan Hooker, Mallett felt that the drop-off was understandable.

Boks intensity reduced

“It turned into a really easy 40 minutes. The second half not so much, there were many more handling errors, not so good in the air, but again, we don’t want to quibble, there’s a psychological change that happens when you’re 45 points up,” he said.

“The team doesn’t go out with the same razor-sharp intensity and obviously the opposition are determined to fight back.

“They’re not a nothing team, they’re a proud nation and I thought in that second half they put up a fight.

“Morne van den Berg outstanding, Sacha outstanding, Ethan Hooker brilliant, the pack of forwards as a whole excellent.”

Mallett did have one slight doubt going into the big France clash on Friday, with Thomas du Toit starting and Louw on the bench, but that was answered by Erasmus’ team selection.

“A question mark was perhaps around picking those two props (Ox Nche and Du Toit) together and the other two props off the bench. My view is you should destroy them with your most powerful front-row,” he added.

“Start with Wilco, Ox and Marx, and if the game loosens up, you get the athletes coming on in the last 20, 25 minutes.

“Rassie’s done it the way he has with his best tighthead and second best loosehead, his best loosehead with his second best tighthead. It worked [against Italy] but we didn’t dominate the scrums as I know we can.”