DHL Western Province loose forward Juarno Augustus played a crucial role for the Junior Boks in their 23-23 draw against France U20 in Georgia on Wednesday.
Playing in their opening game of the World Rugby U20 Championship, the Junior Boks were forced to come from behind to secure a tense stalemate with their French counterparts.
There were 10 DHL Western Province players in the match-day 23 with centre David Brits, flanks Zain Davids and captain Ernst van Rhyn, lock Salmaan Moerat and prop Carlu Sadie all joining Augustus in the starting line-up and Daniel Jooste, Lee-Marvin Mazibuko, Nama Xaba and Damian Willemse on the replacements bench.
Augustus scored a brace, with his first try coming in just the second minute, before he forced his way over for a decisive try in the dying stages which gave Curwin Bosch the chance to level the scores with a conversion in added time.
Junior Springboks coach Chean Roux praised his team’s tremendous character undr pressure to secure the draw.
“It was nerve-wrecking, but I had confidence that we could score in the end,” said Roux.
“I knew that if we get ball possession late in the second half we would convert it into points, just as we did in the first half, because we had very little possession in the second half.
“The players showed tremendous character and that is fantastic in a World Championship.”
Roux singled out the team’s conditioning as one of the main positives in the match and said they would address the areas of their game that needed to improve in the next few days.
“The positives were that similarly to some of the warm-up games, we ended on a high note, so I think our superior conditioning pulled us through in the end,” said Roux.
“There will always be negatives if one doesn’t win a match. But I will have a look at the video to see what the negatives are and we will work on that.”