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Springboks winger Brian Habana insists that South Africa have a fantastic chance to win this year’s Rugby World Cup despite their inconsistent form leading up to the tournament.
The 32 year old believes that despite his side losing four out of five Tests before their opening game shock defeat against Japan, their improvement of three successive victories against Samoa, Scotland and the USA has put the 2007 champions in a strong position.
The Springboks face Wales in this Saturday’s quarter-final at Twickenham, and Habana has compared this season’s squad to that of their last trophy success.
“This team has the same potential to achieve something great,” said Habana. “After that first weekend shock loss against Japan we had to stand up and be counted.”
South Africa destroyed the USA last week, and Habana was instrumental in his sides 64-0 victory, scoring an impressive hattrick.
Habana is now the joint all time World Cup try scorer with 15, level with New Zealand legend Jonah Lomu, and he is one of eight survivors from the Springboks squad that won the World Cup in 2007.
“In 2007 we had a smooth run into the World Cup, where this year it was more stop-start with a couple of injuries and a couple of losses before the tournament,” Habana continued.
“We have learnt quite a few lessons over the last three weeks and we can use those going into this knockout phase where you have eight of the best teams in the world competing for that little cup called Bill.”
As we head towards Saturday’s match, the Springboks will be full of confidence as Wales have won only twice against them. However, one of those victories came the last time the sides met in 2014 when Wales ended a sixteen match losing streak against the Boks with a 12-6 victory in Cardiff.
