“I said what I said,” says Etzebeth

Springbok lock, Eben Etzebeth, says he was targeted by Irish media after he accused Ireland of being arrogant following last year’s World Cup pool match between the sides.

Speaking on a podcast in April, the back-to-back Rugby World Cup winner said probably 12 of the 23 players in Ireland’s squad said see you guys in the final after the Irish won the Pool B encounter 13-8 in France.

Ireland, however, fell to New Zealand in the quarter-final again, while South Africa went on to retain the World Cup after beating the same All Blacks in the final.

When asked about his comments yesterday ahead of Saturday’s Test against Ireland in Pretoria, Etzebeth doubled down on his remarks.

“Look, I said what I said. It was after the game, and I see a lot of them said ‘how could I count exactly that amount?” said the towering lock.

“You just give an estimate because it was definitely not less than six or seven, it wasn’t more than 20 of them. I just gave an estimate.”

Etzebeth, who started last year’s pool game in Paris, added: “I said what I said. We’ll never after a game tell a team ‘We’ll see you in the final’ if there’s so much rugby still to be played.

“Maybe that was their way to say they think we’re a good side and ‘we might make it all the way through’, but people definitely interpreted that a bit wrong and took it a bit out of context.”

Etzebeth addressed the media after being named in an experienced South Africa side that includes 12 World Cup winners for the first Test against Ireland at Loftus Versfeld Stadium.

Here it is, your #Springboks match-23 for the highly-anticipated first Test against Ireland in Pretoria – more here: https://t.co/IowLhMqHO3 🇿🇦#ForeverGreenForeverGold pic.twitter.com/bZoFqXvQuU

— Springboks (@Springboks) July 2, 2024

While South Africa are back-to-back World Cup winners, they have lost their past three encounters with Ireland.

Ireland, however, have never won a series in South Africa.

“From their side, they probably have unfinished business to try and get number one [in the world],” said Springboks head coach, Rassie Erasmus.

“We don’t talk like that. We analyse players, we see how they perform in the URC [United Rugby Championship] and European Cup, then pick our team from players we think can do the job for us.

“We train really hard. We try to stay in our reality but our reality is we’re playing at home against a team that has beaten us. All the games were really close, they deserved all of those.”

The two-time World Cup winning coach says they’ve got a score to settle.

“I’d rather take a World Cup, two World Cups and a British and Irish Lions series and take the three losses,” he adds.