Six Nations champions Ireland shrugged off injury concerns to dish out a stunning 29-15 defeat to South Africa at Dublin’s Lansdowne Road on Saturday.
It was only Ireland’s fifth win over the Springboks in more than a century.
Ireland, who received a blow before kick off with the last-minute withdrawal of virus-hit flanker Chris Henry, wrote a notable page in their history with tries from Rhys Ruddock and Tommy Bowe, four penalties from Johnny Sexton and one from Ian Madigan.
Wales captain Sam Warburton lamented his team’s nail-biting 33-28 defeat by Australia, but said it was just a question of when, and not if, they beat a leading southern hemisphere side.
Wales outscored the Wallabies by four tries to three, but fly-half Bernard Foley kicked 18 points to guide Australia to a 10th consecutive victory over the Welsh, in coach Michael Cheika’s first Test in charge.
Since taking the reins at Wales in 2007, coach Warren Gatland has won only one of 26 matches against the three southern hemisphere giants, a 21-18 victory over Australia in 2008.
Warburton was keen to focus on the positives after a ninth successive single-figure loss to the Wallabies. “It’s the best game we’ve started in November internationals or Six Nations in quite a long while,” Warburton said.
“We managed to match the intensity of Australia. Everyone knows in the squad and the management that we’ve got the ability to beat these teams. They’re not going to be consistently this close the next nine or 10 matches and not go our way once, it’s a just a matter of when.”
Game winner Foley told the BBC: “It was a squad effort today. The guys were relentless in their efforts and it was a true team effort.”
In London, New Zealand started the European leg of their November tour with a hard-fought 24-21 win over England at Twickenham.
In a match billed by some as a potential World Cup final between the reigning champions and the 2015 tournament hosts, the All Blacks recorded their fifth straight win over England following a 3-0 home series victory in June.
England were 14-11 up at half-time but New Zealand, with captain Richie McCaw scoring a try, hit back in the rain-lashed second half before a last-minute penalty try for the hosts narrowed the score.
“We are just happy that our last visit to Twickenham of the season is a win,” man-of-the-match McCaw told Sky Sports. “Ten months is a long time in rugby though, we will have to see if it has any effect at the World Cup.”
Scotland came out on top of an expansive clash with Argentina, despite a late fightback from the visitors, winning 41-31.
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