The Springbok Sevens side snuck into the quarterfinals at the Olympic Games Sevens tournament with a 49-5 win over Japan to confirm a rematch with arch-rivals New Zealand later on Thursday evening.
The Blitzboks needed to win by 21 points to qualify for the quarterfinals, having lost their opening two games to Ireland and New Zealand, and were full value as they dominated every facet of the game to put in a performance that was more like their fans are used to.
But New Zealand’s last-gasp try to beat Ireland meant that they top the group and the seedings, while South Africa snuck in at eight, and the two sides will meet again.
Coach Philip Snyman will be pressing home the fact that the performance needs to be a lot better than day one, where New Zealand dominated and beat the Blitzboks 17-5 when the two sides meet at 21h00 (CAT, GMT+2) on Thursday night.
Knowing they needed to score the 21 points, the Blitzboks were quick out of the blocks, and took less than four minutes to rack them up, as Zane Davids, Impi Visser and then Shilton van Wyk crossed the line early on.
Ryan Oosthuizen added a brace to take them to 35-0 up at halftime before Kazuma Ueda finally put Japan onto the scoreboard.
The Blitzboks closed it out with a Rosko Specman try and another from Shilton van Wyk to book their place in the quarters and keep their Olympic dreams alive.
Results
Samoa 26 Kenya 0
Argentina 14 Australia 22
USA 33 Uruguay 17
Fiji 19 France 12
South Africa 49 Japan 5
New Zealand 14 Ireland 12
Playoff matches Thursday night
Places 9-12 semifinal
Samoa v Japan (20h00)
Uruguay v Kenya (20h30)
Quarterfinals
New Zealand v South Africa (21h00)
Argentina v France (21h30)
Fiji v Ireland (22h00)
Australia v USA (22h30)