Siya Kolisi says the Springboks have addressed their shortcomings during a tough week and “have no choice” but to improve in the rematch with the Wallabies in Sydney on Saturday. DYLAN JACK reports.

Kolisi said the world champions are hurting but have been hard at work to make sure they are more clinical than they were in the 25-17 loss to Australia in Adelaide.

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“It’s been tough and we feel it. It was a tough loss last weekend and we want to be better as a team. We left a lot of opportunities out there on the field,” said Kolisi.

“We are hurting. We have worked as hard as we can to make sure that we are better at some of the mistakes that we made last week. We always point fingers at ourselves first.

“It has been an emotional week and we want to be better.”

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Kolisi said the mood in the Bok camp has echoed the sentiment among supporters in South Africa and that the players know how vital Saturday’s game is to their Rugby Championship hopes.

“We fully understand the frustration. We accept that. When we celebrate, our fans celebrate with us, so we are also feeling the same kind of frustration. When we finish the game and we sit with the coaches and watch the game, we can see that we should have finished those opportunities. We feel that frustration.

“All we can do is say that we will do our best to do better this weekend. We are grateful for those thoughts and we do take them seriously because without the people we wouldn’t be able to do what we love.

“I hope that they don’t give up on us,” added Kolisi. “We have worked really hard this week and we definitely want to take our opportunities this weekend. We want to be as consistent as we can. We want to make sure that we start with better intent this weekend.

“We have to be better, we have no choice.”

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The Springbok skipper added that he and his teammates have made a point of ensuring they are quicker out of the blocks in Sydney, after two successive sluggish starts against New Zealand and Australia.

“We’ve addressed it and we addressed it today again. Starting with intensity is a big focal point for us. We could feel it last week. We didn’t miss a single tackle in that first try, but they had more intensity than us.

“When we sing the anthem, all you should be thinking about is your first actions. That’s important for us as a team and it has been addressed really well this week.”

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Photo: Mark Kolbe/Getty Images