He’d traveled with his father to the opening game, where the Springboks were playing the defending champion Australians, and was one of the 60,000 crammed into Ellis Park when host South Africa held off Lomu’s New Zealand team to claim the title.
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It was the defining flourish of a remorseless display. This evisceration of the USA was everything their encounter with the Cherry Blossoms should have been: ruthless, disciplined, businesslike. Now they top their group and are on course for a quarter-final with Australia or Wales.
The secondary target of securing third place, which would mean an automatic berth at the next World Cup in Japan in four years’ time, is still a possibility, although even that would require an unlikely win against Pool B leaders South Africa as well as a victory over Japan on Sunday.
Heaping praise onto Habana, Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer said, “I’m so proud of him, not just as a rugby player but a human being as well”.
“When we’ve really needed him [Habana] in the last three weeks, he’s been at his best”, Meyer said, reports World Rugby.
Bryan Habana had never played rugby before the 1995 World Cup, a tournament he remembers vividly for the way blockbusting All Blacks winger Jonah Lomu carved up England’s defence and for the way Nelson Mandela presented the winning trophy to the Springboks.
But for Habana, records are as nothing compared to the enduring thrill of representing his country.
They put that to rights quickly and within eight minutes of the restart Habana and Hooker Bismarck Du Plessis put Bok nerves at rest.
“First half, I was so pleased with the way our guys played”, he said.
“Since Bryan’s first appearance, he has been an unbelievable finisher”.
“We’re happy because for the first time we’ve qualified directly for the World Cup, it’s an historic moment for Georgia”, center Davit Kacharava said. It is that man Habana again.The 32-year-old produces a well-timed run in acres of space and collects De Allende’s pass to dive over. He is looking forward and getting the ball in his hand. But the once beleaguered head coach can take comfort from the fact that his side are, however belatedly, starting to function at full tilt.
Habana said the response was unbelievable, “probably one of the most polished performances I’ve been involved in in the Springbok jersey”. “The confidence is there”. “We want to see him go forward and break more records”. “I know what this team can do”.
But Francois Louw was pinged for going in off his feet, and Vermeulen knocked on towards the end of the first 40 minutes to stop South Africa dead in their tracks.
A second soon followed, when referee Pascal Gauzere awarded a penalty try for one collapsed scrum too many.
There were two possible yellow cards that went unpunished, while less than a minute after the break Habana scooted through onto Fourie du Preez’s grubber to score.
Jesse Kriel added the ninth try of the evening in the 73rd minute, before Lwazi Mvovo applied the final gloss to take the Boks’ tally into double figures with the last play of the game, with Morne Steyn adding the conversion to make the final score 64-0.
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It was the first time the US had ever been shut out in World Cup competition.
