The South African sevens team have a clear picture in their heads on what will be needed in the Stade de France at 3.30pm on Saturday afternoon when they face France in the semi-finals of the Paris Olympics .
That picture, according to interim head coach Philip Snyman, was partly imprinted by the Springboks 10 months ago when they outplayed France at the same venue in their Rugby World Cup quarter-final thriller, where three former Blitzboks Olympians, made a significant contribution to the Boks one-point victory.
Cheslin Kolbe , Kwagga Smith and Kurt-Lee Arendse all made telling interventions that night and that will inspire the Blitzboks to follow suit, Snyman said.
We all saw that game and how guts and determination brought the win, said Snyman. We are going to need that as well, apart from being clinical, especially on defence.
France will be boosted by the massive crowd, but like the Springboks, we plan to use that as our motivation as well. They are a team that play well when they gather momentum and play with a lot of flair, but brutal defence is one way to stop that. That will be our aim tomorrow.
