Rassie Erasmus has described the Springboks' 66-7 Nations Championship Northern Series victory over Italy in Turin as "satisfying" while making clear the performance level must rise sharply for the matches against France and Ireland to follow.
The Boks ran in six tries before the break to lead 45-0 at halftime, then added three more in the second half while conceding one, completing a comprehensive evening at the Allianz Stadium. Erasmus, however, was candid about the drop in intensity after the interval.
"It's almost impossible to put 80 minutes together at 100 per cent," he said. "Italy are a proud team, and despite being 45 points down, they started running the ball from everywhere, while we also made some changes that we wanted to see, and with that one loses a bit of rhythm. But when you win 66-7, I don't think you can start nitpicking problems in the second half. It wasn't perfect, but it was proper."
He was more pointed about what the next fortnight demands: "We have to play much better than this if we want to be competitive against France and Ireland."
A late injury disrupted Erasmus's matchday plans when Salmaan Moerat withdrew before kick-off with back spasms, forcing Lood de Jager into the starting lock berth and Franco Mostert onto the bench. Erasmus confirmed Moerat had been managing the problem since Thursday but had appeared fit at captain's run. "Hopefully it's not too serious. He's the only casualty we have from the game."
On discipline, Erasmus noted the Boks conceded just one penalty in the first half and roughly five across the full match, alongside five turnovers — figures he regarded as acceptable, with the caveat that the second half was "a little soft".
Asked about the team's capacity to keep building as a collective, Erasmus pointed to continuity and gradual integration of new faces. "The biggest thing is that we've been together for eight years now, and we're slowly bringing in guys like Ethan Hooker, Morne van den Berg, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Ruan Nortje, Cameron Hanekom, Jan-Hendrik Wessels, and Thomas du Toit is now back with us too. When you go to a game like this and everybody is calm and understands the system, it's satisfying."
The squad departed for Paris on Saturday evening ahead of Friday's Test against France at the Stade de France.