Durban — The Blitzboks’ recovery in the World Sevens Series continued in their second match of the London Sevens on Saturday when they saw off Ireland 19-12.
Ireland were a shock winner of the Blitzboks in Toulouse and revenge was certainly in the minds of Neill Powell’s men.
But they got off to a poor start when Impi Visser was guilty of shocking discipline when he leaned over and tapped the ball out of the scrumhalf's hand and was yellow carded for his sin.
The South Africans still managed to keep the Irish on the back foot throughout the first half and with 15 seconds to go before the break Zain Davids muscled over in the corner and the touchline conversion put them 7-0 up.
However, that good work was undone when the Boks fluffed the kick-off and Ireland cruised through for the simplest of scores and one that would have had Powell pulling his hair out.
And to make matters worse for the Bitzboks, Ireland then won the restart and scored once more to lead 12-7 with five minutes to go.
Muller du Plessis looked to have undone some of the harm when he scored in the corner but a confused TMO ruled that he had lost control of the ball when he grounded it but that was untrue.
But there was no robbing Mfundo Ndhlovu when he wriggled through the defence and the Boks were ahead 14-12, and the victory was sealed shortly after when Angelo Davids went over unmarked.
IOL Sport