Rugby: Deans in no hurry to relive nightmare

Robbie Deans. Photo / Getty Images

Even with 26 hours to kill on the long haul to South Africa, Wallabies coach Robbie Deans wasn't able to bring himself to watch a replay of his side's 30-14 Bledisloe Cup hammering at the hands of the All Blacks.

The battered and bleary-eyed Wallabies arrived in Durban late on Sunday night, desperate to get their Tri Nations campaign back on track with victory over the new-look Springboks on Saturday.

Deans and his charges had plenty of time to digest their bitterly disappointing loss to New Zealand, with the squad enduring a painful 26-hour trek across the southern hemisphere since Saturday night's Eden Park ambush.

After a 3.30am checkout from their Auckland hotel, the Wallabies had a quick stopover in Sydney before jetting 15 hours to Johannesburg and then catching a connecting flight to Durban.

They were acclimatising on Monday and planning to gear up for the Springboks with a light run on Tuesday afternoon.

Normally, Deans would use his travel time to review the Wallabies' previous outing, but this was one nightmare he wasn't in a rush to relive.

"I've started ... I've started,'' he said at Durban airport.

"It hasn't changed my first impressions a lot. It just reinforced where we were tactically poor.''

The players themselves have acknowledged as much, with prop Ben Alexander agreeing with Deans' assertion that they may have got a little ahead of themselves following a 39-20 rout of the Springboks in Sydney last month.

"A lot of lessons were learnt,'' Alexander said.

"We were confident going into the game with the build-up we'd had and the result we had against South Africa and then two good weeks of training, but it just showed we've still got a lot of work to do yet if we want to consider ourselves a genuine (Tri Nations and World Cup) chance.

"The way we attacked in the first half allowed them to tee off on us and, conversely, when they were attacking, we didn't slow down the ruck so they were able to shift the point of attack so we weren't able to tee off on them and put shots on them.

"The way they were attacking, they were just a lot smarter. They were clinical.

"Every ball that went in the air, they just seemed to have a Richie McCaw or someone to get their hands on it and put pressure on us.

"They just kept turning us around and putting pressure on us, whether it be putting points on the board or someone coming up with a big play.

"It's not so much back to the drawing board, but we'll learn a lot out of that and be better for it.''

The tourists are expecting no let-up from the bolstered Boks, with coach Peter de Villiers having recalled his heavy artillery after controversially leaving 21 frontline players in South Africa for their opening two Tri Nations Tests in Australia and New Zealand.

"They'll be fresh now and they'll be raring to go,'' Alexander said.

"Their World Cup campaign starts now. They've had a bit of time off now and they'll be well prepared.

"They've had nearly two months since the Stormers were their last South African team left in the (Super Rugby) comp and wins over here are always pretty rare.''

- AAP