Jones hails ‘brave’ Japan

Ever the pragmatist, Japan coach Eddie Jones put into perspective what this will mean in Japan, where soccer heroes such as Keisuke Honda and, before him, Hidetoshi Nakata, have got used to sharing the sporting headlines with baseball stars.

The Springboks, two-time World Cup winners, are still licking their wounds following the humiliating defeat to minnows Japan at Brighton on Saturday.

Japan delivered a massive shock on the second day of the tournament to throw South Africa’s campaign into turmoil with a brilliant display for rugby.

31 World Cup is the biggest to date, and organisers expect it to generate commerical revenue of around 240 million pounds ($372.19 million).

Further down the list, Georgia are rewarded for their 17-10 World Cup victory over Tonga by jumping three places into 13th.

Japan’s players went on a lap of honour with the national flag amid roars of support from the 29,000 crowd in Brighton in southern England.

Burger said South Africa had to analyse and fix what went wrong so the team can compete against Samoa.

“As I have already said, we have two objectives here: reach the quarter-finals and to be the team of the tournament”.

Jones admitted to a sense of disbelief after watching his side secure a 34-32 victory when Karne Hesketh dived over the line in the 84th minute to score the winning try. “It was an absolutely unbelievable scene which will live with me for the rest of my life”, he said in the Daily Mail.

“Now the history has changed for Japanese rugby”.

“If we manage that, then we can get ourselves into contention for the game”.

Chief among those is the freshening the front row that destroyed the Springboks trio of hooker Bismarck du Plessis, his prop brother Jannie and Tendai “The Beast” Mtawarira, one of the most experienced in world rugby on Saturday.

However, Burger warned that tough tests still awaited the courageous Blossoms at this World Cup.

The key to doing better than the Springboks is to cut out the mistakes they made, he said while also pointing out that Japan had leaked some soft tries themselves and exposed some flaws that Scotland can hope to take advantage of.

They’d been drilled by the mischievously talented Eddie Jones, a man who was a hooker in his playing days when he used iron drive to make up for a lack of bulk.