All Blacks punish Bulls' mistakes in commanding victory at Loftus

All Blacks punish Bulls' mistakes in commanding victory at Loftus

The Bulls were often their own worst enemies on Saturday night, squandering several golden try-scoring opportunities with costly errors at crucial moments. Combined with a shaky defence that was repeatedly exposed by the All Blacks' skilful handling and passing, it made for frustrating viewing.

On a couple of occasions, the Bulls did manage to get it right, with Stravino Jacobs' superb second-half try a particularly memorable moment. They were also far more competitive in the second half than the first, but by that stage, the damage had already been done.

The All Blacks opened the scoring through Josh Moorby after 14 minutes, shortly after the Bulls had wasted a golden opportunity to draw first blood.

The Bulls thought they had responded almost immediately when Hanro Liebenberg crossed the line, but the try was ruled out by the TMO after a knock-on in the build-up.

The All Blacks then turned the screw, with Moorby crossing for his second try before Beauden Barrett added the conversion to make it 12-0.

The visitors continued to threaten and Codie Taylor crossed twice before half-time, with Josh Jacomb adding a conversion to give New Zealand a commanding 24-0 lead at the break.

The Bulls came out with far greater intent after half-time and finally got on the scoreboard through Ruan Vermaak, who produced a strong run to score their first try.

Curwin Bosch converted to reduce the deficit to 17 points, but any hopes of a comeback were quickly extinguished by a mistake from the Bulls straight from the restart.

Leroy Carter crossed for New Zealand after taking full advantage before Rieko Ioane added another try, with Jacomb converting to put the All Blacks 36-7 ahead.

Stravino Jacobs gave the Bulls another lift with a beautiful try in the 54th minute after some great work from Jeandre Rudolph.

New Zealand continued to exploit gaps in the Bulls defence and Carter scored his second try of the evening in the 67th minute following a fine exchange with Jacomb.

The Bulls eventually added a third try through Coetzee in the 74th minute, with Bosch converting to make it 43-19.

But the All Blacks had the final say as Wallace Sititi burst through the Bulls defence to score under the posts, before Jacomb converted as the visitors made it three wins from three on their tour of South Africa.

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