{"id":591685,"date":"2026-09-06T06:22:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T06:22:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/591685\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T06:22:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T06:22:13","slug":"black-ferns-make-history-by-outclassing-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/591685\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Ferns make history by outclassing South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Black Ferns overcame four yellow cards to outclass the Springbok Women 52-20 in Johannesburg this morning.<\/p>\n

In the curtain-raiser to the All Blacks v Springboks Test at FNB Stadium, the visitors scored eight tries to four as they claimed a comprehensive victory in the first-ever match between the two sides in South Africa.<\/p>\n

The Black Ferns opened the scoring in the first few minutes, with some nice passing leading to a try to openside flanker Elinor-Plum King.<\/p>\n

Fullback Braxton Sorensen-McGee was the next to score after breaking through South Africa’s defence on the right side, and first-five Hannah King nailed the conversion to put the visitors ahead 12-0.<\/p>\n

The Springbok Women struck next, hooker Lindelwa Gwala scoring from a maul following a lineout close to the Black Ferns’ line. The conversion was unsuccessful, with the score 12-7 to New Zealand after about 15 minutes.<\/p>\n

The Black Ferns lost a player to the sin bin in the 28th minute. wing Mererangi Paul yellow-carded for knocking the ball down when the Springbok women were on attack.<\/p>\n

The hosts took advantage of the extra player, and after winning a penalty following another impressive lineout drive they took a quick tap and midfielder storming over from close range to cut the Black Ferns’ lead to 12-10 with 10 minutes left in the first half.<\/p>\n

The Springbok Women were dominating the scrum and earning regular penalties, with the Black Ferns falling foul of the referee on several occasions.<\/p>\n

\"Black<\/p>\n

Black Fern Elinor-Plum King. (Source: Photosport)<\/p>\n

New Zealand were the next to score following a break from wing Ayesha Leti-I’iga, prop Veisinia Mahutariki-Fakalelu going over from close range after a quick tap to extend the Black Ferns’ lead to 17-10, before Sorensen-McGee kicked the conversion to push their advantage out to 19-10.<\/p>\n

The Black Ferns scored their fourth try after the halftime siren, Sorensen-McGee going over for her second of the match on the right edge to give the visitors a 24-10 lead at the break.<\/p>\n

South Africa started the second half strongly and won a string of penalties from lineout drives, with Black Ferns hooker Georgia Ponsonby yellow-carded after the visitors pulled down a Springbok Women maul.<\/p>\n

The hosts scored a try following another lineout drive to cut the Black Ferns’ lead to 24-15, and New Zealand then had Leti-I’iga yellow-carded for a professional foul, reducing the visitors to 13 players.<\/p>\n

The Black Ferns though didn’t go into their shells and halfback Maia Joseph stepped her way through the score to push their lead out to 29-15. Sorensen-McGee added the extras to make it 31-15 to New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Flanker King then scored her second try of the game and New Zealand’s sixth, with Sorensen-McGee kicking the conversion to extend the Black Ferns’ lead to 38-15 after 57 minutes.<\/p>\n

Loose forward Amarante Sititi came off the bench for the Black Ferns, with her and her brother Wallace – who was in the reserves for the All Blacks’ third Test against Springboks – the second set of siblings to play for the New Zealand men’s and women’s rugby teams on the same day.<\/p>\n

Sititi was the next try-scorer, barging over from close range after the Black Ferns stole a lineout off the hosts, and Sorensen-McGee kicked the conversion to push the visitors lead out to 45-15 with less than 10 minutes to go.<\/p>\n

Lock Maama Mo’onia Vaipulu then ran over to score after a jinking run by replacement back Justine McGregor, and the conversion was good, the Black Ferns storming out to a 52-15 lead with about five minutes remaining.<\/p>\n

The Black Ferns had a fourth player yellow-carded with Vaipulu sent to the sin bin after the fulltime siren, and South Africa then scored a consolation try, with the score finishing 52-20 to New Zealand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Black Ferns overcame four yellow cards to outclass the Springbok Women 52-20 in Johannesburg this morning. In…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591686,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[10898,111,139,69,213],"class_list":["post-591685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-black-ferns","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}