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JOHANNESBURG - Timana Tahu says he feels shattered by his nightmare run-on debut for the Wallabies, but he's also itching for a square-up after experiencing South African gloating.
Former NRL star Tahu started in a rugby test for the first time on Saturday and learned what it was all about in the worst possible way as Australia crashed to their biggest ever defeat, 53-8 to an unstoppable Springboks outfit at Johannesburg's Ellis Park.
Tahu took over from the injured Berrick Barnes at inside centre having played just 23 minutes of test rugby before Saturday.
"I've had a few (heavy defeats) in my career and it's just not the best thing in my debut in the starting side...you get given a chance to prove yourself and it's just shattering," said Tahu.
"I was looking for a rope to hang myself.
"South Africa just played out of their skin.
"The first five minutes everything was going well but after that it just felt like we were running backwards all the time.
"It was probably one of those games where you just want to wake up and just think this is a bad dream."
If the nightmare wasn't bad enough, Tahu also had to swallow the Boks' celebrations.
"South Africans sure know how to rub it in and I think that's what made it feel worse," he said.
"The crowd and listening to them after the game, you can hear people cheering and carrying on and it makes you angry, it makes you really angry, it makes you want to play them again next week or tomorrow and try and see if you can square things up."
Australia arrived in Johannesburg confident they were in with a real chance of ending their awful run on the highveld after a breakthrough win in Durban and with the Springboks seemingly in disarray under eccentric new coach Peter de Villiers.
Tahu may have arrived at Ellis Park without any "baggage", but there's no doubt he will have left with some.
"It's really hard to get into the stadium, the traffic, the crowd," he said.
"It takes you about half an hour, 40 minutes squeezing through the traffic and then you're getting into the stadium and there's a rowdy crowd. But it was a good experience."
Tahu's ability to read the play at inside centre was always going to be a key factor in Australia's performance and the Boks had no hesitation in aiming plenty of traffic at the Wallabies midfield.
"I felt comfortable, I felt my defence is probably one of my strengths but there's probably just a few little technical things," he said.
"I missed one tackle there which cost us a try, for me personally that was probably the down point of my game but I thought I was doing everything right."
He said he had no real opportunity to get going in attack.
"I was disappointed with my game, very disappointed ... I've got to learn from it," he said.
"It felt like as a backline we didn't really get enough opportunities to prove ourselves, there were bits and pieces, we did make a few little breaks here and there but overall in the whole game it was just a battle uphill.
"They got the first three tries and then it was a battle just to keep on going.
"Games like this you live it, you learn from it and then you've got to move on.
"At the moment it's hard but I think this is only going to make us stronger and make us more determined when we play (New Zealand) in Brisbane."
- AAP
