Take away the muscles and add a moustache and there is a strong resemblance to one Peter de Villiers. That is a stretch even for the mighty Peter to wrap a conspracy theory around that one, but I bet he could give it a good go.
With the Tri-nations title already locked away in the All Blacks trophy cabinet, this match was about avoiding the wooden spoon and the World No.2 IRB ranking.
For Robbie Deans and Peter de Villiers it was about guaranteed continuity of employment. Both were feeling the heat and a loss could mean watching next years IRB Rugby World Cup on the television.
The Wallabies looked to have put the horrors of surrendering a healthy lead last week at Pretoria well and truly behind them by racing out to a 31-6 lead with half time looming.
Sadly it was not to be as the Springboks – many playing for their careers – threw everything at the Australians and found themselves in the lead with 19 minutes to go.
From there with a stadium full of South African supporters cheering on their team it should have been one way traffic. But Australia despite Saia Faingaa getting sin-binned for a dangerous tackle and having made over twice as many tackles as South Africa in the match did what Aussies do best – not give up.
Their chance came deep into the final minute of the match, trailing 38-39 English referee Wayne Barnes. Yes the same Wayne Barnes beloved of New Zealand rugby fans who could not spot a French infringment in a whole second half of rugby in Cardiff 3 years ago, managed to see Springbok forward Flip van der Merwe committing heinous crimes in a ruck and promptly awarded a penalty to Australia.
That was the good news for the Wallabies. The bad news was that it was 48 metres out on the angle and out of James O’Connors range. With Matt Giteau on the sideline it fell to Kurtley Beale to take the shot.
Kurtley had only taken one kick in international rugby before and that was the previous week in Pretoria which he missed. Kurtley obviously decided that today was as good a day as any to become a national hero and duly kicked the penalty.
His punishment was to be repeatedly kissed and hugged by his team mates. The South African crowd always happy to applaud good play cheered on Kurtley in full voice. Ok I admit that journalism and reality have parted company somewhere in that last sentence.
Well done Australia for burying the hoodoo of not having won at altitude in South Africa for 47 years.
All Black fans will be slightly nervous about the World Cup next year, not because the Wallabies are growing in strength but because Peter de Villiers will probably get the chop, and the Springboks might end up with a coach who can do his talking through his team on the field and not with mindless conspiracy theory quotes.
The way South African rugby has worked in recent years we will probably end up with Winnie Mandela as the new coach.
