The Springbok Women delivered a solid 20-0 win over Spain in Seville on Sunday and for Franzel September and the rest of the coaching staff, it was a constructive day at the office in their final WXV Global Series tour match.
September, who shares the head coaching responsibilities with Laurian Johannes-Haupt, said it was a productive day in many aspects of their play and although they didn’t use all their opportunities, they were pleased with the overall outcomes from the match.
“We are very proud of the ladies, who stuck to their guns today in very hot conditions,” said September after the test at the Estadio Olímpico de la Cartuja in Seville.
“To come to Spain and score 20 points without conceding any points is a good day. We have trained in hot conditions all week, but today was tough and having two water breaks is proof of that. Playing at 12h00 with the sun right above your head was not easy.
“We did leave some tries out there, but to finish the tour with such a commanding win was great for us. We can now look back on the gains from the tour and once we come back to South Africa, start the focus on the two matches against Ireland in Cape Town later this month.”
September said the injuries to the front row, with Babalwa Latsha injuring her ankle and Nombuyekezo Mdliki leaving the field on a stretcher a bit later, were disruptive, but the fact that they still had set piece dominance speaks volumes of the combined effort by the pack.
“We also had some niggles in the backline, but despite that the team pulled together and a coach cannot ask for more than that,” he said.
“They really made us proud. We will have the medical reports from those niggles later this afternoon and take it from there.
“We made some mistakes, but we did play the full 80 minutes and that was great. We were playing for everyone back home as well, which added to our feelings of content after the match.”
September said the coaching staff were particularly happy with the way they managed to kill the flow of the Spanish team: “We wanted to disrupt their attack to make sure they can’t get going and the fact that they could not score tells you how successful that was.
“We managed to kill their attack at source. The other highlight for us was our discipline – we neither conceded any cards nor executed high tackles. One of our aims is to be the best disciplined side at the next World Cup and we set a good standard towards that today.”
The Bok Women will arrive back in South Africa on Tuesday.