South Africa v Wales LIVE: Result as Springboks cruise to Nations Championship win

Wales skipper Dewi Lake gave a surprisingly upbeat interview to ITV after the loss, describing his pride at the performance and saying his side have shown a lot of growth since the autumn (when they did lose 73-0 to the Boks, to be fair)

Lake said: “I’m massively proud of the boys, some people might be shocked with me saying that with the scoreboard looking as it does, but for me there is a lot of improvement in that.

“You compare that performance to the performance in the autumn against the Boks.

“We’re not happy with the nil on the scoreboard, we’re not happy with losing, there’s a lot for us to improve on, but we’ve had growth and I’m proud of every single one of those boys that pulled the jersey on and gave everything on that field today.”

Wales failed to score a single point once more against South Africa as the Springboks ran out convincing 43-0 Nations Championship winners in Durban.

South Africa won their previous meeting 73-0 in November when Wales, without England and France-based players in a Test played outside World Rugby’s official window, conceded 11 tries and suffered their heaviest home defeat.

The world champions were nowhere near as ruthless on home soil, but still scored seven tries with Jasper Wiese, Cobus Reinach, Jesse Kriel, Jaco Williams, Herschel Jantjies, Kurt-Lee Arendse and Paul de Villiers crossing.

Read the full report from the game:

“I think you can see in our faces we wanted to bring our physicality,” man of the match Paul de Villiers, who scored his first international try, tells ITV.

“We did in the set pieces, in the carries, and in our defence. The ball was a bit wet which cost us in our execution.”

“It was a hard game today, we knew how physical they were going to be and respect to them they were really good today,” Wales back row Jac Morgan tells S4C

“It was a physical game, I’m a little bit gutted we couldn’t get any points on the board but fair play to the boys they stuck in for long periods of the game. Our discipline let us down at times and that gave them opportunities.

“There’s work for us to do as a squad. We know that, every week we come in and try to improve. You can see as a team that we’re developing over the last few months. I respect all the boys for their effort over the summer.

“It’s been three hard Tests and we’ve been tested. We just have to stick together and carry on improving. They are a great group of boys and the heart they’ve shown to keep battling is something we can take pride in.”

The Springboks weren’t really tested today and finish the first phase of this Nations Championship with three wins from three

And that’s that! The match ends, fittingly, with a knock-on.

South Africa never got out of third gear, were sloppy in possession, made countless handling errors and still completely outclassed Wales – battering them seven tries to nil.

The world champions are on a different level to everyone else in world rugby and Wales will probably be relieved to leave having only shipped 43.

And a seventh try to finish for the Boks! The maul rumbles from the lineout and Paul de Villiers is the man at the back to dot down. A first international try in his third Test.

Libbok nails the conversion for good measure

Edwards chips from his own 22 to try and create some magic but all it does is give Kriel posession. He links with Libbok and Willemse as they look for a way through.

A kick across engenders pure panic in Hawkins who can only fumble it out of play for an attacking Boks lineout.

The Welsh scrum is marched backwards, as it has been all day, but they scramble the ball away. However, Mee makes a hash of a kick through, which Libbok seizes upon and jinks between tacklers but his offload hits the deck off the hands of Kriel.

That sort of sums this match up.

It feels weird to say, given they lead six tries to nil, but the Springboks really haven’t been very good today. It’s been scrappy and mistake-filled. They’re needlessly offside from a Welsh box-kick as the latest error.

Wales have still been outclassed, mind. They’re duly pinged for not releasing shortly after. They are back to a full complement as Ben Warren trots back on though. Also a scrum-half change as Reuben Morgan-Williams is on for Tomos Williams