Bryan Habana: ‘Jonah Lomu will never be beaten’

One of the most hard questions facing South Africa coach Heyneke Meyer this week is who to select at lock for the Rugby World Cup quarter-final against Wales at Twickenham on Saturday.

“The only part that was missing from that game (against Australia) was how clinical we weren’t”.

“It’s essential. If you look at the England game [against Wales], the score was 28-25 with one try each, but the chance to build the score through penalties influenced the game”.

“We have to learn that pretty quickly in a short space of time so that if we’re presented with those opportunities again, we’re good enough to take them”.

“Everybody was so impressed with Australia, not just their goal-line defence but the way they defended the scrum and kept them out at the line-out”, McFarland said.

A lot has changed in a year though and the Bok flyer believes his side can get the better of their Northern Hemisphere opponents on Saturday.

Ospreys winger Eli Walker has been recalled to the squad in place of foot-injury victim Williams, but will not be considered for selection against the Springboks as he has only just got over the hamstring problem which forced his withdrawal from the group last month.

They have conceded just a single try in three games since and that came from an intercept against Scotland. “We fully understand that and hopefully the combination of what has been working for us in the past two weeks will keep on improving and we can go forward”, Habana said. They have got a strong off-loading game too when they choose to. We know what is ahead of us. “We want to be battle-hardened, not battle-weary”. If we don’t pitch up with the full intensity on the day we know we will come second.

“When they (Wales) did move it, one superb read on the fly-half by Adam Ashley-Cooper, he stopped everything stone dead out there”. It’s about matching them at that initial gain-line challenge.

Wales, who have only beaten the Springboks twice, ended a run of 16 consecutive defeats with a 12-6 victory at the Millennium Stadium in the last meeting between the two sides in November 2014.

“It is very very brutal in terms of the collisions but I think what has been impressive this World Cup has been the performances of Japan through to Namibia”, he said. That was our fourth game against Australia on Saturday and we pushed them all the way.

“We were left scratching our heads as to how we lost it in the end”.

So much so that going into the final pool match against Australia, George North was played as a centre.

The Boks have enjoyed time off since their 64-0 rout of the United States in their final pool match last Wednesday but regrouped at England’s base for the tournament at Pennyhill Park on Monday.

“We have to take a few positivity”, McBryde said.