South Africa captain Victor Matfield will tell his Springbok side to "forget about the weaknesses of the Australian scrum" ahead of Saturday’s Tri-Nations Test in Perth.
Matfield, who was sin-binned with seven minutes remaining of last weekend’s historic 30-28 victory over New Zealand at Carisbrook, insists staying focused on the job rather than believing what may or may not be a weak Aussie scrum will be the key to success.
"We’ve come here before and been troubled at scrum-time,” Matfield told The Daily News. "Good scrumming is like good defence – it’s all about focus and what you do on the day. We’re going to have to be aggressive in that department.”
Meanwhile, he claimed the Springbok complaints about All Blacks tactics at the scrum in the first Test in Wellington were proven correct by the way referee Matt Goddard controlled last weekend’s Test in Dunedin.
"We got an even contest in Dunedin. The referee patrolled the area well and that’s all we’re after,” he said. "Look at what we did in Dunedin in the scrums and compare it with what happened in Wellington.
"Does one team improve so much in a week and the other get so much worse?”
South Africa now want New Zealander Bryce Lawrence to act similarly in this weekend’s contest.
Matfield is also looking for his side to prove they deserve their world champions tag after several comments were made the Springboks claimed the crown without beating Australia or New Zealand.
"So for us it was great to beat one of them last Saturday on their own ground and now we want to beat the other,” he said.
"Our aim is to win the Tri-Nations but what happened in Dunedin is only one game. There are four more to go.”
