Japan 34-32 South Africa

JAPAN turned its first matchup with behemoths South Africa into the biggest shock in Rugby World Cup history on Saturday with a 34-32 win.

Nearly four minutes into added time, replacement back Karne Hesketh charged into the edge of the left corner, the crowd’s roar could probably be heard in Tokyo and Japan’s players collapsed to the ground in a mixture of joy and disbelief.

The noise level in Brighton was already deafening after full-back Ayumu Goromaru had made it 29-29 with 10 minutes to go.

“It was amazing at the end, I think even Springbok fans were supporting us … maybe not,” Japan coach Eddie Jones said, adding that he’d “had to look at the scoreboard at the end just to see if it was true or not.”

Replacement fly-half Handre Pollard kicked a penalty to put South Africa ahead 32-29 with seven minutes left.

But after Japan refused to kick for a draw, persistence and ambition were rewarded as the ball was swept from right to left, and Hesketh squeezed through.

The Springboks scored four tries to flanker Francois Louw, hooker Bismarck Du Plessis, lock Lood De Jager and replacement hooker Adriaan Strauss, but could never put daylight between themselves and the Japanese.

The 1995 and 2007 World Cup winners looked distraught, and some fell to the floor in disbelief as Japan’s players carried flags and stood in a line to wave and bow as they milked the cheers of the delirious 30,000-strong crowd.

“We’ve been training to beat the Springboks for the last three years,” Japan back Michael Leitch said. “We want to celebrate this win, but we’ve got Scotland around the corner so we have to prepare.”

Japan had only won one World Cup match before Saturday.

“We’re at a loss for words to describe our performance,” South Africa captain Jean de Villiers said.

“We have to take responsibility for this performance because it’s way below par for the standards we set. It wasn’t good enough by a long shot.

“Credit should go to Japan for the way they stuck it out.”

“Our target was to make the quarter-finals and to be the team of the tournament,” Jones said.

“Now history has changed for Japanese rugby, now we’ll have kids back home who wanted to be baseball or soccer players who want to be the next Michael Leitch or Gorumaru.”