Baby Boks go top after downing Georgia
Wandisile Simelane and Manie Libbok bagged braces while Juarno Augustus and Yaw Penxe rounded off the South Africans' six tries. Lasha Tabidze and Giorgi Gogoladze grabbed five pointers for the hosts.
The Junior Springboks will face a nervy wait on the availability of Zain Davids, who lost his cool in the final minute of the match and shown a straight red card for a head-butting an opponent.
In the other Pool C encounter, a final second try handed France a dramatic 26-25 victory over Argentina.
In Pool A, Australia continued their unbeaten run with a tough 33-26 win against Oceania rivals, Samoa. While England earned their second bonus-point victory after a hard-earned 34-22 victory over Wales.
New Zealand may have been playing in temperatures in the mid-30s but it was Italy that felt the heat in going down 26-68 in their Pool B encounter while Ireland's hopes of advancing to the quarterfinals were dashed when Scotland got the better of them 32-28 in a hugely entertaining eight-try contest.
Pool C
South Africa 38-14 Georgia
The Junior Springboks overcame a tightly-fought first quarter against the tournament hosts in front of a hostile crowd and managed to outscore them three tries to one in the first half. They built on this with a solid second-half showing, in which they added three tries to take their total for the match to six.
"The Georgians played well in the beginning and made it tough for us at times as they tried to slow down the game while we tried to speed it up but we will take the bonus point win.
"We scored a few fantastic tries. We have a very talented backline that can score tries from anywhere on the field. The character the team showed on defence to shut out Georgia after several phases at times during the match was also outstanding.
"This is a special group of players and we can build on this performance going into the match against Argentina," coach Chean Roux said.
Junior Springboks No.8 Juarno Augustus crossed the chalk for the team's first try from a pick-and-go in the 16th minute, which fullback Jeanluc Cilliers converted to hand the team a 7-0 lead.
Georgia fought back strongly and managed to get close to the South African's try-line on a few occasions after camping there for several minutes and their efforts paid off with a converted try by prop Ushangi Tcheishvili to level the scores.
South Africa built on this with more attractive attacking rugby in the second half, which saw wing Yaw Penxe cross the try-line after a strong run. Simelane followed as he scored the team's fifth try in a fine showing of fantastic inter-passing and support play to power their way to 31-7 lead.
Georgia struck back with a try by replacement back Giorgi Gogoladze, who touched down from a grubber kick, which they successfully converted to take their score to 14 points, but this was soon cancelled out by Libbok who gathered a stunning pass by centre Damian Willemse.
A yellow card for replacement flank Hendre Stassen in the dying minutes reduced the team to 14 men, and minutes later Zain Davids was red-carded, while the Georgians also received a yellow card. But despite sustained pressure by the hosts on the try-line, they were unable to add to their score.
Scorers:
For South Africa:
Tries: Augustus, Simelane 2, Libbok 2, Penxe
Cons: Cilliers 2, Bosch 2
For Georgia:
Tries: Tabidze, Gogoladze
Cons: Aprasidze 2
Yellow cards: Guram Gogichashvili (Georgia, 49), Hendre Stassen (South Africa, 74), Tornike Jalagonia (Georgia, 81)
Red card: Zain Davids (South Africa, 81; head butting an opponent)
Referee: Tom Foley (England)
Assistant referees: Christophe Ridley (England), Andrea Piardi (Italy)
TMO: Jon Mason (Wales)
Argentina 25-26 France