Mental focus must be much higher for South Africa as they anticipate a bruising clash with Samoa in their second Rugby World Cup Pool B match after their shock defeat to Japan, veteran winger Bryan Habana said on Tuesday.
“Our mental capacity and focus must be both on a higher level and much improved,” he told reporters as the Springboks tried to pick themselves up after an embarrassing setback in which they lost 34-32 to Japan in the biggest upset in Rugby World Cup history.
“We have had a hard talk and a hard look at each other as individuals and where we stand,” Habana said of the post-Japan match analysis. “We are trying to be as positive as possible after what was a rather depressing weekend.”
Photo: AFP
“It’s about now bouncing back,” he said. “We all realize how much we let everyone down, but there is still something special within in this squad and so we want to bounce back and install hope again. It will take small steps, but it starts on Saturday.
“Our past games against Samoa have always been physical and of a high intensity. From minute one to minute 80, we have to realize we’ll be in a tough game,” he said. “We must be prepared not only for ruck time, but collisions in defense and attack. They come and they keep on coming for 80 minutes.”
“They pride themselves on their physical approach,” he added. “These guys [Samoa] will probably take a lot of confidence out of what happened to us last Saturday, but I really do believe we can come out successfully on Saturday.”
Habana said the Boks had vastly underestimated the Japan threat.
“As well coached as they were, we didn’t fully understand what they would bring,” he said.
“We didn’t adapt quick enough. [Japan coach] Eddie [Jones] had a pretty simple plan, they disrupted us at the breakdown and not many of us have experienced being tackled below the knees the way we were on Saturday,” Habana said.
“The lower-tier teams are going to be a lot more competitive for a lot longer in this tournament,” he said.
“It was one of the toughest days for many of us in our rugby careers, but we can’t change the past,” Habana added.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier