Pool D review: Veterans see Boks through

Pool D threw together defending champions South Africa, a well-prepared and ambitious Wales and the Pacific "bruise brothers" of Samoa and Fiji, along with South Africa's neighbours Namibia.

Before the tournament some pundits wondered if the Springboks had erred in selecting so many of the veterans who delivered the Webb Ellis Cup four years ago and questioned their form after they finished last to Australia and New Zealand in the 2011 Tri Nations, albeit while resting their best players.

Instead, South Africa's coaching staff embraced the challenge of a tough pool and the senior players set about proving experience counts at World Cups, provided the performance is still there.

"We came into the competition a little underdone and we used the (pool) games to prepare ourselves for the play-offs," said backs coach Dick Muir.

The Springboks survived the test. Their defensive patterns proved particularly strong in their punishing first and last pool matches against Wales and Samoa, won 17-16 and 13-5, enabling them to finish top.

Successful formula

Wales coach Warren Gatland raised a few Springbok hackles by saying before their opening match that South Africa had a limited game plan which they executed well, but it didn't involve "playing rugby"; in other words they depended on their successful 2007 formula of set-piece control and liberal use of the kick to dominate territory.

The Springboks fed the stereotype by warning opponents to expect an aerial attack, with Muir saying winning was more important than scoring tries, before hitting Wales in the opening minutes with a well-worked try and winning the match with another.

Then, after vowing not to get involved in Pacific Island-style rugby against the Fijians, they beat them 49-3 before going on to an 87-0 victory over Namibia.

But it is still their defence and the goal-kicking of Morné Steyn that make them extremely dangerous, although they are marginally less so without long-range specialist Frans Steyn, who is back home with an injured shoulder.

Their bench is also one of the strongest in the competition, possibly second only to New Zealand, which Springboks coach Peter de Villiers says can tilt the balance as it did in their match against Wales.

"I think that is the way to go, you can have something up your sleeve. If you don't have that you become as ordinary as everybody else," de Villiers said.

Youthful and fit

Second-placed Wales came into the tournament with a generally youthful and very fit side, captained by the youngest player ever to lead his team in a World Cup match, 22-year-old flanker Sam Warburton.

Although bitterly disappointed at letting South Africa back into a match Wales could have won, Gatland's side bounced back with a bruising 17-10 defeat of Samoa and an 81-7 win over Namibia, with midfielder Scott Williams scoring a hat-trick of tries on his debut. Wales's winning margin of 74 points was their biggest at a World Cup.

Warburton is living up to the praise heaped on him by Gatland at the start of the tournament and number 8 Toby Faletau is also proving a handful for defences. Young fly half Rhys Priestland takes the ball to the line with courage and Gatland has the boot of the experienced Stephen Jones to back him up if the match gets tight.

Wales's final performance of the pool, a 66-0 defeat of Fiji in the rain, was no real test but enabled them to give their combinations a workout ahead of the quarter-finals.

Third-placed Samoa felt that tight scheduling had made their task harder, with only a four-day turnaround between their matches against Namibia (won 49-12) and their clash with Wales. They then had to face South Africa five days after beating Fiji 27-7.

Hard-fought match

Despite the difficulty, Samoa gave the Springboks a real battle, scoring the first try against South Africa since Wales crossed in the first pool match. The hard-fought match resulted in Samoa full back Paul Williams - one of their best players on the night - getting the first red card of the tournament and the first RWC red card by a Samoa player in 20 years. However, no further sanction was applied.

Fiji did not manage to produce the exciting continuity expected of them and conceded 167 points in their four pool matches. Their 66-0 defeat by Wales was their worst at a Rugby World Cup.

Finishing a distant fourth was also their worst RWC performance since 1991 when they were last in a four-team pool, and means they now have to qualify for 2015.

Namibia's Welwitschias conceded 266 points in their four matches including two particularly heavy defeats: 87-0 by South Africa and 81-7 by Wales.

They have lost all of their 15 matches at Rugby World Cups and conceded at least three tries in each match.

Namibia's 44 points scored and their five tries are their most in a single World Cup. However, the 266 points they conceded is the second-highest tally by any team in a World Cup, behind only the Welwitschias' own 310 points in 2003.