John Smit
‘It [the Wallabies’ perceived infringement at the breakdown] was the only talking point between he and I. The message clearly wasn’t going through. I guess he (Pocock) was brilliant at capitalising on the way the breakdown was being interpreted. When you are brave and keep the ball, normally you are rewarded. That wasn’t the case tonight.’
Peter De Villiers
‘Tactically we played correctly but the breakdown was a mess. In a quarter-final you have to take your chances and we didn’t take ours. Well done to them. They had a few [opportunities] and they took them. For the rest of the time we were in control. A couple of calls never went our way, but now isn’t the time to talk about the ref.’
Victor Matfield
‘Considering the way we played, it was tough to lose like that. We always felt it was a matter of keeping the ball and getting into the right position. We felt that the wall would eventually break. Unfortunately that moment never came. Fourie du Preez came within half a metre of scoring and then there was the forward pass. So we did have our chances. We did everything to win the game but win the game. It’s heart-breaking.’
Gary Gold
‘We knew the role David Pocock would play and that he needed to be managed. Losing Heinrich Brussow was massive for us. But Flo did well when he came on. We will have to look at it again, but my feeling watching it live, there was a big issue with the daylight at the breakdown. I don’t think we could have been better prepared. We struck a good balance, we were great defensively, we scrummed well, our lineout was good and so was our maul. We also had a good balance on the bench. We felt we did a lot well, so to lose is heart-wrenching.’
Danie Rossouw
‘For me personally it is devastating. He said I sacked the player, but as far as I know you are allowed to sack the player. He gave a penalty, so I don’t know. I didn’t play him in the air. It is a sad day for me. There are a lot of guys here that I made friends with, that I wasn’t already friends with, and we became a brotherhood here. That is the saddest thing for me – we became big mates and now it is all over. We had a great performance. We played most of the rugby and we had a brilliant game. One or two calls didn’t go our way … I don’t know, we should have made more of our opportunities.’
Fourie du Preez
‘We did all the hard work tonight, and during the World Cup, to win this game, and to come up short at the end of the day is hugely disappointing. It has been a long road for us and this is a very sad exit. Any game you lose in a Springbok jersey is hugely disappointing and you don’t want to lose badly either. If you look at the way we played, we are proud of our performance tonight and that makes it so much harder to take. We felt that we were in control the whole game, even after the first half when we went to the change room at 8-3. We felt that we were totally in control and that’s just the way rugby goes. We did enough to win the game, it just didn’t show on the scoreboard. When you play against one of the best openside flanks in the world, and the ref allows him to slow the ball down, he will always be very effective. It was very tough for us, but we didn’t do enough to sort him out, so credit to him, he really played well.’
Mark Reason (Daily Telegraph)
‘Lawrence made a complete hash of the game … and the Springboks will be furious. They identified the breakdowns as a crucial area of the match beforehand, but they did expect there to be some sort of reffing. The South Africans thought that the tackler would have to release the ball-carrier. They thought that the off-side line would be respected. They thought that men would have to stay on their feet. Instead it was a shambles. South Africa will feel cheated and they have every right to complain.’