The SA Schools team, along with the under-18 England side, pulled their second consecutive victory out of the bag in the International Series on Tuesday.
The six teams in the series went head-to-head at Outeniqua Park in George for the second round and only SA Schools and England remain unbeaten.
After having a run-away win against Wales on Saturday, the SA u/18 side had a tougher battle against France in this round, but managed to one-up them with a 12-5 defeat.
SA under-18 A team knew England was a major competitor from the start, but just couldn’t out-perform the visitors. The home side had to walk off of the field with a heart-breaking loss of 33-8.
The match between Wales and Italy was just as entertaining as the Young Boks’ games. After a massive loss against the SA Schools team, Wales emerged victorious in the showdown against Italy with a final score of 32-10. This makes Italy the only team in the series with no wins.
SA Schools 12 (9) France 5 (0)
It was a converted penalty by full-back, Curwin Bosch that opened-up the score board and put the SA u/18 side in a 3-0 lead. The penalty came in the eighth minute after the home side applied some good pressure on France’s attack.
The game continued to be very physical with the forwards of both teams putting their bodies on the line to break the line, but each side’s defence prevented their opposition from getting tries.
France kept crumbling under the pressure and gave away another two penalties to the SA side before the 31stminute. This allowed Bosch to stretch his team’s lead to 9-0.
In the last 10 minutes before half-time France’s presence was felt by SA as the visitors kept ball possession within five metres of the hosts’ try-line. Never the less, South Africa’s defence stayed solid.
The second half was no different as the two teams kept their defence tight. It was clear in the 55th minute that this would be a kicking game when Bosch put the ball between the posts for the fourth time in the game to extend the home team’s lead to 12-0.
France kept hammering at the hosts’ wall for most of the game to no avail. It was only in the last minutes of the game that France’s Thomas Darmon fell over the South African try-line to narrow the gap to 12-5. But they were unable to convert Darmon’s try as well as the penalty kick they received afterwards.
The SA u/18 team managed to prevent the visitors from another try before the final whistle to take their second victory of the series.
Scorers:
SA Schools
Penalties: Curwin Bosch (4).
France
Try: Thomas Darmon.
