Jongi Nokwe scored four tries as the Springboks powered to a record 53-8 victory over the Wallabies in their Tri-Nations rugby test played at Coca-Cola Park on Saturday. Blow-by-blow scoring:

The Wallabies hadn’t won at the venue for 45 years but they certainly wouldn’t have expected to instead concede a 45-point victory margin while left-wing Nokwe became the first Springbok to score four tries against Australia.

Nokwe registered his hat-trick within 23 minutes with three tries in a row from the 12th to the 35th minute but disappointingly damaged his ankle and had to be replaced as he supported fellow winger Odwa Ndungane on the inside in the act of scoring his fourth in the 49th minute.

After going down 15-27 a week ago in Durban the Boks surprised friend and foe alike with a massive turnaround as they raced in eight tries to run up a victory that surpassed their previous best win against the Wallabies – 61-22 at Loftus in 1997.

And the key to the transformation was the manner in which they controlled possession, strung the phases together and contested the breakdown.

It was almost as if the teams had switched jerseys as the Boks dominated the set-pieces, re-discovered their lineout skills and kicked the ball astutely while the Wallabies committed an uncharacteristically high rate of errors and ran up blind alleys.

The Wallabies had a chance to score a try in the 2nd minute but Giteau’s pass went behind Hynes, took a 3-0 lead in the 5th minute when Giteau kicked penalty but after that their best formations were those they formed behind the posts as they awaited conversions.

Andries Bekker set the ball rolling, after Conrad Jantjes made the initial breach by chasing and re-claiming his own up-and-under before re-joining the line to put the tall lock in, with the first try in the 8th minute to make it 7-3 and there was an element of surprise in the crowd when Nokwe’s almost casual touch-down wide on the left made it 12-3 after 14 minutes.

With a number of players, in particular the loose forwards Juan Smith and Pierre Spies, scrumhalf Fourie du Preez and fullback Conrad Jantjes, turning in their best performances of the year the Boks were controlling the ball and the pack gained a big lift when a heel against the head led to Nokwe’s second try in the 25th minute.

Smith came up just short of the line as the Boks drove strongly but quick re-cycling sucked in the defenders and even though a pass went to ground Adi Jacobs was able to recover the ball, feed Odwa Ndungane who put his fellow wing in unchallenged.

With James missing two conversions that made it 17-3 and the flyhalf made amends by goaling a penalty to take the lead to 20-3 after 30 minutes.

Whether it was complacency or the altitude the Wallabies were way off the mark and one had a sense of something special developing when Nokwe got his third try in the 35th minute – Burger having charged clear off the back of a lineout before linking with Jean de Villiers and when the ball came back James exploited a massive advantage in numbers by sending a long pass spinning to the “Transkei Express.”

It was 27-3 at the break and any thought of the Wallabies fighting back from there was soon snuffed out after just four minutes of the second half as De Villiers slipped his marker and with a deft back-flip put Adi Jacobs away on a swerving 40 metre dash to the line.

Nokwe got his 4th thanks to a well-weighted grubber and good chase by Ndungane and with the score climbing to 39-3 the Australian were dead and buried.

However replacement George Smith had an almost immediate impact when he burst through to get in behind the Boks and set in motion a cycle of phases that resulted in the Wallabies’ solitary try for fellow substitute Drew Mitchell. (39-8)

The Boks however were in the ascendancy and with the 50/50 referee’s decision going their way they charged to a new record victory margin over a team who had twice beaten them in this year’s Tri-Nations – 16-9 in Perth and 27-15 in Durban a week ago – to retain the Nelson Mandela Plate.

Ruan Pienaar gave credence to the view that he might make an excellent flyhalf with a deft-footed try as he jinked through from the 22-metre line (46-8) and Ndungane had the honour of taking it over the 50-point margin with a try (his first for the Springboks) which was just reward for his high work rate.

There will be a tendency to claim this win as a demonstration of a new expansive game but in truth it was nothing but. It was simply Springbok rugby at its best – hard, physical, sound basics, ruthless contesting of the ball, determined protecting of it and clinical striking once the hard work had been done.

The Springboks can play in this manner, they have before and now the goal of all concerned must be to ensure that they do not stray away from it again.

Scorers were:

South Africa (27) 53: Tries by Andries Bekker (8 min), Jongi Nokwe (12 min, 25 min, 35 min), Adi Jacobs (44 min), Jongi Nokwe (49 min), Ruan Pienaar (68 min) and Odwa Ndungane (78 min). Butch James kicked three conversions and a penalty and Percy Montgomery two conversions.

Australia (3) 8: Try by Drew Mitchell (55 min). Matt Giteau kicked a penalty.

Source: sarugby.com