Dan Biggar is confused by an issue being made over the confrontational nature of Wales’ performance against South Africa.
Wayne Pivac’s side fell agonisingly short in their bid to create history at the home of the Springboks, losing 32-29 in an epic contest at Loftus Versfeld.
Springbok captain Siya Kolisi admitted Wales "got under our skin" as the visitors raced out to an 18-3 lead in a first half which saw two altercations after the whistle had been blown. In the second, Damian de Allende shoved Liam Williams after what appeared a legal clearout, with Gareth Thomas taking exception.
Wales refused to be bullied in a fiery Loftus, one of the great rugby cathedrals, but their approach saw them end up on the wrong side of inexperienced referee Nika Amashukeli and it became their undoing.
Kolisi's comments sparked a series of questions about Wales' approach from South African journalists in the post-match press conference, with Biggar left bemused.
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Biggar said afterwards: “I don’t know what the referee expected us to do, just come here, lie down and give South Africa everything their own way? From our point of view, we wanted to try and get in their faces, get in their faces and not take a backwards step. That’s part of the game.
“We were coming here and if you stand off South Africa out here then you’ll get steamrolled pretty quickly. You need some aggression and competitiveness and get into it. I didn’t see any issue. They were just as niggly, competitive and as abrasive as we were. From our point of view that was perfect for us.”
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When pressed on the issue by local media, he added: “The decisions will be analysed. But from our point of view, I don’t understand why people are bothered about it. It’s a Test match and we’re away from home against the world champions. I’m not quite sure what people expected from us, just roll the carpet out and applaud them off the pitch?
“I don’t know what the issue is. It’s a Test match and we were more than happy to get stuck into them. That’s what Test matches are about.
“I really don’t understand. I see it as a non-event. That’s exactly what you want from a Test match, you want it confrontational, you want it aggressive.
“There was no dirty play or anything. We just went at it and got confrontational. It worked for us, certainly in the first half. I’ve got no issue whatsoever, what happens on the field... you shake hands afterwards and there is absolutely zero issue.”
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