CHARVIS: “WE WERE MORE COHESIVE”

Despite suffering a 33-16 defeat to South Africa, Charvis says Mike Ruddock’s injury-hit Grand Slammers have momentum on their side.

”We played some good rugby and were far more cohesive than we have been in recent weeks,” the former skipper told the South Wales Evening Post. ”I don’t think the team are back to where we were in the Six Nations, but you could definitely see we are on the way towards it.

”I think credit has to go to South Africa who were very accurate in what they did and they did it for the whole 80 minutes.”

Charvis played his part in a durable Welsh back-row display and battled hard against the barnstorming Boks trio of Schalk Burger, Juan Smit and Jacques Cronje. It doesn’t get any easier this weekend with the twin scavengers, Phil Waugh and George Smith, providing Wales with a different set of challenges.

”It will be a different battle against Australia,” admitted Charvis. ”Those two players (Waugh and Smith) work their trade very well. They are very quick and strong over the ball at the breakdown.

”It means there will be a different emphasis this week on what we want to do with the ball in contact and on the floor. I felt there was a good balance with Martyn Williams and Michael Owen. Martyn has probably got a bit more in his legs and in his tank than I have when it comes to being an openside and he played very well.

”When you come up against a South African team, whoever they play against, physical dominance is something they always aim for and I felt we matched up to them for a lot of the game.”

Wales may have taken a number of positives from Saturday’s performance, but Charvis insists that hasn’t diluted the disappointment of another defeat to a southern hemisphere superpower.

”We are all very disappointed by the final scoreline. We thought we were a bit better than that,” added the Newcastle Falcon. ”We all get down when we lose but we have to pull together.

”The only people who can put this right are the players and the coaches and those guys around in the squad at the moment. We have seven days in which to pull together and see if we can get things right in time to face the Australians.”