Springbok Women focus on breakdown improvements ahead of second Test against Canada

THE Springbok Women struggled at the breakdown area in the first Test against Canada at Loftus at the weekend, so it was no wonder that it was an area of focus ahead of today’s second Test at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Gqeberha.

- ROWAN CALLAGHAN

The Bok Women conceded a flurry of penalties at the breakdown in the 50-20 loss against the world’s second-ranked team in Pretoria on Saturday. They also struggled in the scrums and line-outs, typically an area of strength for the powerful South Africans.

Bok Women’s forwards coach Laurian Johannes-Haupt said they had worked hard on fixing Saturday’s shortcomings at training this week.

“We definitley want to sharpen our skills again at set-piece time, scrums and line-outs,” she said. “We had a big focus on the breakdown, on being explosive there.

“Their reaction to the breakdown needs to be sharper and quicker. We did a lot of drills around getting that back on track.