Even a Jenkins’ super show can’t stop Boks rolling on
AT THE end of a thunderous night in shuddering defiance of the pouring rain, Siya Kolisi made a beeline for his opposite number.
The Springboks’ noble captain recognises a heroic fellow back-row forward when he sees one. In the rush to shake Ellis Jenkins by the hand and slap him on the back, Kolisi made sure that, first and foremost, he paid due homage to the one who made it back against cruelly overwhelming odds.
His very presence, three years after his career had been all but destroyed by the pulverising damage to his right knee in the final seconds of a famous victory against the same opposition, was an event itself. What followed almost defied belief.
Far from being content at merely surviving the most implausible of come-backs, Jenkins almost inspired Wales to something they had achieved only once since the advent of the 21st century, victory over the reigning World Cup holders.
For more than an hour last night, the man who flogged himself through three operations and long periods of darkness over 30 punishing months did more than anyone to make his nation believe in itself again, that Wales would do to the Springboks what they had done to England’s world-beaters on a wintry Saturday 16 years earlier.
During a gripping match the heaviest of all the heavyweight packs on the rugby planet threatened to flatten anyone and everyone in their path, not once, not twice but three times. On all three occasions one figure in red lifted the siege, Jenkins.
Nobody can ever have come back after so long and gone so close to etching his name in gold lettering over his return. The Cardiff player’s first act of salvation, in the 22nd minute after Wales had somehow withstood a multi-phase onslaught close to their line, was to win a penalty against all the odds. Wales, holding on to a trio of Dan Biggar penalties at 9-6, followed up by with a double whammy.
No sooner had Biggar’s fourth penalty doubled their lead than Damian De Allende’s searing break hurled them back into a tight corner. Rhys Carre’s exit to the bin for an illegal side entry into a ruck made the corner infinitely tighter.
This time the Boks pummelled Wales through 15 phases and just when it seemed inevitable that something would give, Jenkins’ breakdown service eased the crisis with a priceless interception.
Handre Pollard’s third goal having halved the Welsh lead at the interval, the Springboks prepared to finish the job six minutes into the second half. The advance party of their socalled ‘Bomb Squad,’ the formidable front row triumvirate of Vincent Koch, Malcolm Marx and Steven Kitshoff, moved in for the kill.
The executioners had no sooner started their grisly work than Jonathan Davies denied Lukhayno Am with a scything tackle. In the mayhem that followed, they besieged Wales for a third time and once again Jenkins averted the crisis, this time with a turn-over which allowed Johnny McNicholl to clear.
Had the roof been closed, the ovation would have lifted the roof off its hinges. And for the second time it gave them the belief to hit back hard enough for Biggar to restore the sixpoint advantage with his fifth penalty.
Wales were playing it smart, so smart that their technical efficiency ensured that the first half passed without any more than one scrum, conceded by a rare fumble from Aaron Wainwright. The subsequent demolition of their set-piece would have had the Marx gang rubbing their hands with glee on the bench.
Where their line-out had repeatedly blown a gasket against the All Blacks, Wales avoided a repeat by aiming for the front-jumper as a safe, albeit limited option. Avoiding further exposure to the wrecking machine of the Springbok scrum would be asking too much.
Frans Steyn’s guided missile from four metres inside his own half and another Pollard penalty
from much closer range had tied it up at 15-all when a shameful pitch invasion helped the Springboks survive a swift Welsh strike which put substitute full back Liam Williams hurtling towards the left corner.
A spectator had invaded the pitch and been brought down by security men a few metres away from Williams.
Instead of at least five points, Jenkins, acting captain following Davies’ exit, instructed Biggar to settle for three. Wales, ahead for the third time, really began to believe it would be there lucky night when New
Zealand referee Paul Williams disallowed Mapimpi’s try 12 minutes from time.
South Africa eventually got their scrums, three in fairly rapid succession which brought three penalties. They drilled one into the corner and once the driving maul had been set, nobody could stop Marx ploughing over, not even Jenkins.
Elton Jantjies’ failed conversion offered Wales hope that a seventh shot at goal would still do the trick. Instead the last penalty, the 29th of the match, fell to Jantjies from point-blank range.