Rassie Erasmus acknowledged the Springboks were far from their best in Buenos Aires on Saturday but drew genuine satisfaction from the character his side showed in grinding out a 17-10 Rugby Championship victory over Argentina at Estadio José Amalfitani.
The match was level at 10-all at half-time before Cameron Hanekom's try in the fourth quarter broke the deadlock. Argentina pressed hard in the closing minutes but the Boks held firm.
"Our focus was purely on beating Argentina today, and we had a tough day out there," said Erasmus. "We looked leg-weary early on, gave up a lot of territory, and made errors which we knew were likely with seven or eight players having played very little rugby in the last six or seven weeks."
Erasmus had left fifteen players behind in South Africa, and the disrupted preparation showed in the Boks' attacking fluency. Defensively, however, he was encouraged. "To concede only one try, which came from an offload we probably should have stopped, tells me our defence was largely intact."
The coach was pointed about where the work lies: "What we need to sort out is our attack. A number of players were short on game time returning from injury, but getting them through 80 minutes was always going to affect our fluency. The positive is that we got them through the game."
Erasmus framed the result in the context of high-pressure rugby: "The lesson is that knockout-level rugby is always close. For us to stay calm through that, even without playing our best rugby, tells me we're handling pressure a little better than before."
Siya Kolisi, who left the field with a hamstring injury in the first half, was equally measured in his assessment. "We have a huge amount of respect for them, and we could easily have lost this game. Home or away, they're one of the toughest teams we play all year."