Siya Kolisi says it’s “funny” how much flak the All Blacks have copped for an indifferent 2022, during which they statistically performed better than the Springboks.

New Zealand won an eighth Rugby Championship title, before returning from their November overseas tour unbeaten, to finish the year with eight wins and a draw from 13 Tests for a win percentage of 62%.

The Boks too, ended the calendar year with eight wins from 13 Tests for the same win ratio, but lost one more match than the Kiwis.

Speaking on SENZ Breakfast, Kolisi was asked about the All Blacks’ form this year and the criticism they’d received, after having suffered a first home series defeat in 27 years and a maiden home loss to Argentina, that had head coach Ian Foster’s job on the line.

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“It’s funny how you say it’s been a tough time for the All Blacks while they’ve won almost every competition they’ve played in,” the Springbok skipper said.

“That’s a good, tough time to have. That just shows the expectation of the group and I think it’s an amazing group.”

The Boks brought the curtain down on their Test season with a first win over England at Twickenham in eight years, but the world champions lost to Ireland and France in Dublin and Paris, respectively, and were stunned for the first time by Wales in the Republic in July.

“For us, we’ve been learning a lot and I think we’ve been improving quite a lot. I think this [November] series has helped us quite a lot and got us a lot of answers,” Kolisi added.

“A lot of players put their hands up so we would’ve loved to win all four games but I think we got the answers we needed.”

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