Namibia New Zealand bound
Namibia beat Tunisia 22-10 at the Hein Geigob Stadium in Windhoek on Saturday to win the Africa Cup and to book their fourth trip to the final round of the Rugby World Cup, this time in New Zealand in 2011.
This was the second leg of the final/qualifier. Namibia had won the first leg 18-13 and so won 40-23 on aggregate.
It was a tense and physical match which the visitors led 10-9 at the interval but the Tunisians discipline let them down badly in the second half in which the referee, Marius Jonker, dished out a red and the yellow cards. But it had started early in the match for the Tunisian captain Souid Hedi was sin-binned for foul play just three minutes into the match.
Namibia's Canberra-based flyhalf Emile Wessels opened the scoring with a penalty. 3-0 after 3 minutes, and then scrumhalf Eugene Jantjies started and finished off a movement that came within centimetres of the try-line. He broke and gave to wing Bradley Langenhoven. When Langenhoven was stopped, Jantjies was on hand but was stopped just short.
Tunisian flyhalf Lotfi Ben Msallem kicked a drop goal which brought the scores level and seemed to give the visitors heart and they came close to scoring a try when prop Aouemri Akrem was tackled into touch a metre from the goal-line. But Wessels kicked a second penalty goal - 6-3 to Namibia. Then from a turnover centre Sabeur Ben Charrada counterattacked and gave to left wing Abbes Kherfani, who dived over next to the posts. Ben Msallem converted = 10-6 to Tunisia.
A long kick by Wessels brought the score to 10-9 - the half-time score.
Namibia attacked from the start of the second half and a fourth Wessels penalty gave them a 12-10 lead and hope of air tickets to New Zealand.
Then came the try of the match as fullback Chrysander Botha counterattacked and Langenhoven and Piet van Zyl carried it on till No.8 Tinus du Plessis scored. 19-10 with 20 minutes to play.
Tunisia attacked, suffered another sin-binning and bashed again till a missed drop by Ben Msallem relieved the [pressure on the Biltongboere who then went on the attack and Wessels kicked an easy penalty.
Scorers:
For Namibia:
Try: Du Plessis
Con: Wessels
Pens: Wessels 5
For Tunisia:
Try: Kherfani
Con: Ben Msallem
Pen: Ben Msallem
Teams
Namibia: 15 Chrysander Botha, 14 Bradley Langenhoven, 13 Piet van Zyl, 12 David Philander, 11 Tinus Venter, 10 Emile Wessels, 9 Eugene Jantjies, 8 Tinus du Plessis, 7 Jacques Nieuwenhuis, 6 Jacques Burger, 5 Nico Esterhuizen, 4 Heinz Koll, 3 Marius Visser, 2 Hugo Horn, 1 Kees Lensing (captain).
Replacements: 16 Shaun Esterhuizen, 17 Johnny Redelinghuys, 18 Jané du Toit, 19 PJ van Lill, 20 Ismael du Plessis, 21 Wacca Kazombiaze, 22 Robert Herridge
Coach: John Williams.
Tunisia squad: Amine Gharsallah, Mohamed Ali Kochlaf, Abdelmajid Zemzem, Abbes Kherfani Haithem Chelly, Amor Hamdi, Lofti Ben Msallem, Aymen Gloulou, Amor Mezgar, Mohamed Garali, Chahir Aouadi, Sabeur Ben Charrada, Aziz El Kassar, Khaled Zegdene, Mohamed Ben Hmida, Sabri Gmir, Sami Limem, Kais Aissa, Aouemri Akrem, Yousri Souguir, Amara Dridi, Souid Hedi.
Coach: Daniël de Viliers.
Referee: Marius Jonker (South Africa)
Assistant referees: Pro Legoete (South Africa), Marc van Zyl (South Africa)