A glorious victory inevitably leaves dejected losers (in the most polite sense of the term) and Ireland's 29-15 win over South Africa is no different. The Springboks' fans won't have been expecting an Irish win anymore than we were and their initial reaction sums that up.
Romain Poite's decision to show Adriaan Straus a yellow card was undoubtedly a key moment and quite a few Boks fans have held the Frenchman up as the main reason for Ireland's victory. Others, however, have said that Ireland simply outplayed South Africa when it mattered most.
That's that. Boks have been as poor as Poite, except that the Boks will get better, Poite won't.
— Kevin McCallum (@KevinMcCallum) November 8, 2014
Romain Poite had his best ever game today for Ireland. #poor @IRBMedia @IRBTotalRugby #IRBTotalyUseless — Martin Gee Godfrey (@FerretGee) November 8, 2014
Make no mistake there is gonna be one hell of a party in Dublin tonight. Hats off to the Irish, they rocked up to win.
— Pat (@RealPatMan44) November 8, 2014
Well done Ireland, you were beaten in the scrums and lineouts, but you beat us where is counts, the scoreboard… http://t.co/NBhk3Yl2v0 — Springbok Rugby Blog (@BokRugbyBlog) November 8, 2014
Ireland totally outplayed the Springboks, very dissapointed
— Gerry Pelser (@gerry_6) November 8, 2014
Boks expected to win by brute force, Ireland on the other hand ,out smarted and outplayed us! We were complacent! #SAvsIRE #SSRugby — Brendan Blackburn (@B_Functional) November 8, 2014
Is this the same team that beat the All Blacks? Very very disappointing. No excuses. Very weak performance. #SSRugby. Well done Ireland.
— Louis Wiese (@LouisJWiese) November 8, 2014
Tactically outplayed today & we haven't adjusted to it all. Still the old adage of 1 dimension rugby for the #Boks. Now let's blame the ref — Reece Mayberry (@ReeceMayberry) November 8, 2014
Well done Ireland. SA wasn't well prepared in game time and paid the price. Poite still didn't ref right. He should not ref SAs game #Poite
— Clyde Alex Matthews (@OfficialClyde56) November 8, 2014
Man of the match should go to @RomainPoite. He sure knows how to screw the @bokrugby! Congrats Ireland, give that ref a @GuinnessIreland ! — Eben Hattingh (@EbenHattingh) November 8, 2014
"I'm sending 16 coz 8 made a high tackle earlier!" Have you ever in your life! Typical Frenchman thinking we all watching him! #IREvRSA
— Patrick Owgan (@PaddyOwgan) November 8, 2014
That 29-15 defeat is the rugby equivalent of a power failure for the #boks — Ashraf Garda (@AshrafGarda) November 8, 2014
"@Ratethe_ref: Would love to see stadiums in SA be as quiet as today's game in Ireland for kicks at goal! Amazing #IREvRSA" #Respect
— That Rugby Jock (@AndreGeel) November 8, 2014
Ireland just gave an exhibition on tackling @awill_sports for any schoolboy out there learning the trade. Great attitude #SSRugby — Yuche Jacobs (@yugels) November 8, 2014
Today's game reminded me of the World Cup semifinal game against Australia, we constantly went in search of try instead of kicking it #Boks
— Agent Black (@Blackflava) November 8, 2014
Worst performance by a #Springboks team in terms of finishing in the last 4 years. Get your heads in the game! #SSRugby #IREvRSA — Wim Pretorius (@Wimster101) November 8, 2014
Time to switch twitter off. Boks to lick their wounds. Sun will come up tomorrow. But boks were taught a lesson tonight. Congrats Ireland.
— Brenden Nel (@BrendenNel) November 8, 2014
That was a proper hiding. And rightly so. Ireland the better team by a country mile, hands down. Huge congrats to Irish Rugby. — Mukiwa (@This_Boy_Ben) November 8, 2014