'Looked a bit forward to me' - 5 Talking Points: Warren Gatland & Dewi Lake Address Springboks Defeat, Wallabies Tour & Sam Parry Exit

After the match, Wales head coach Warren Gatland and his selected captain for the match Dewi Lake spoke to the media. There was plenty to discuss, with hooker Sam Parry's voluntary exit from the Wales squad firmly at the forefront of the conversation.

Gatland and Lake discussed Parry's withdrawal, as well as how they are looking to improve as a squad, before their two test series against the Wallabies next month. Here are the top five talking points from the Wales post match press conference, following the defeat to South Africa at Twickenham.

Of course, we begin with the top story to come out of the weekend, as Ospreys hooker Sam Parry volentarily stepped away from the Wales squad. After learning that he will take a supportive role behind Dewi Lake and Elliot Dee in the hooker ranks, Parry quit the squad and will not be travelling to Australia for the two match test series.

WARREN GATLAND: “He left on Monday. I was surprised he left the squad. He didn’t talk to me. You need to talk to Sam, he hasn’t spoken to anyone. I understand his agent has been pretty vocal which is a little bit disappointing. When Sam came in the week before I was straight up with him, told him the situation he was in with the squad.

“We put a (news) release out to all the players that we had picked 37 and would only take 34 on tour and just wanted to be straight up, as a player I would want to know where I actually stood. I said that he was initially covering for Elliot [Dee] with the injury, so I was clear on that. I said I don’t want to stuff you around, you’ve been brilliant for us when you have come in in the past, just see what happens with that. So I’m not sure how I was disrespecting him there.

“I talked to him on Monday about the competition in the squad, I thought there was some real competition with the hookers. I didn’t mention him by name but I didn’t want to leave Sam out. If I’ve upset him there was no intention, I just would have rather he had come and see me and said the way he felt. It was definitely nothing from me in terms of trying to disrespect him, I just wanted to be honest and upfront with him.

“And I think that would have been a better approach had he come and said that rather than just walking off, really. I suppose you understand that people take things a little bit differently and you just have to deal with it. Whether he’s had any regrets, I know he’s good friends with Gareth Thomas and Gareth contacted him straight away and said ‘look, just get on the phone’.
In the future, yeah. I don’t think we would close a door on a player.

“Whether he has any regrets, sometimes people make impulsive decisions, players as well. I’m the first person to be able to forgive someone in terms of putting their hand up and not getting everything right, making mistakes. You have to have some compassion if it was impulsive. Considering the next day Elliot pulled out with an injury, Sam would have been on the plane. So whether he has any regrets about it I’m not too sure.”

2. Gatland left 'frustrated' by the match officials as pass for Springboks try "looked a bit forward"

There were plenty of cards issued in the match, with Wales and South Africa both having their players sent to the sin bin. Wales dropped down to 13 men at one stage, as Rio Dyer and Aaron Wainwright's time on the side-lines overlapped by a few minutes. Springboks fullback Aphelele Fassi was also shown a yellow card, after his boot connected with Taine Plumtree's face following a jumping catch. Gatland addressed the offences, and was frustrated by some of the decisions made by the match officials at Twickenham.

WARREN GATLAND: [The pass for Mapimpi's try] Looked a bit forward to me in terms of the hands. I thought the penalty against Taine Plumtree, he's made a tackle and rolled east to west and it's a penalty against us. I'd question the little kick at the end of the game where the referee has said he's trying to catch the ball, if you're trying to catch the ball you do that with two hands. Those were the little things that were a bit frustrating from our point of view, considering we had to deal with yellow cards.

"But, you see that and when you've got the world champions in front of you sometimes they tend to get a couple of calls their way. We just have to deal with that and focus on ourselves, be as accurate as we can possibly be.

"The yellow card for Aaron Wainwright, from where we're looking I can't see where he touched the maul. So, that's ended up being a penalty try. I couldn't quite see the difference between the try that was disallowed for us, they looked to me to be very similar situations."

Stepping in to captain his country in the absence of Dafyyd Jenkins, hooker Dewi Lake gave a harsh but fair account of his team's performance against the Springboks. The Ospreys front row was impressed in how his side stood up to the challenge of South Africa, but was displeased by how Wales were unable to keep the intensity going for the full 80 minutes.

DEWI LAKE: "I don't think many would have given us that first half. So there are positives to take. But obviously, you know, we can't be happy with a scoreline like that, with this group and where we want to go. There's no excuses for that for us. So a lot of positives, but a lot of learning to take obviously into the Summer, and learning that we have to do quickly.

"You know what's coming with a South African team, especially this one. They proven they're a world class outfit for the past eight years. Double world champions, that don't come easily. But you know, I think we fronted up well, we showed up in that physical battle. But that last 30, 20 minutes just come up for us. You know, that's something that we've got work on is being in the fight for eighty minutes."

Warren Gatland was forced to shuffle up the engine room for the battle with the Boks, due to an assortment of locks ruled out as unavailable for Saturday's Test at Twickenham. The Exeter Chiefs duo of Dafyyd Jenkins and Christ Tshiunza were ineligible for the fixture, as the match fell outside of the World Rugby recognised international window and the Chiefs locks had to undergo a mandatory stand down period.

Also, Adam Beard was ruled out of the match, as the towering second row suffered an ankle injury. Whilst Jenkins and Tshiunza are set to return to Wales camp for the matches against Australia, Beard, along with former Wales captain Jac Morgan (torn hamstring), are missing out on the triop 'down under'. Despite the hinderance throughout his forwards depth chart, Gatland praised Screetch and Carter's performances.

WARREN GATLAND: "They did really well. I thought Ben Carter put himself around the place. I think he put in a couple of good tackles, I think they both acquitted themselves really well. And that was a massive challenge for them and a big step up. But for those two, I've talked about them putting themselves up terms of going out there and giving everything that they ever had. So, which is a real positive from it."

5. Wales need to 'nail the big moments' if they want to get better as a team for Australia

The defeat to South Africa marks a seventh consecutive defeat for Warren Gatland and his Wales squad, with the head coach recognising where his side let themselves down. Understandably, the cards were stacked against them given the nature of their back-to-back World Cup winning opponents, but Gatland was frustrated in how his side failed to 'nail those big moments'.

Gatland expressed how his side 'switched off a little bit' in the match's latter stages, despite running out a solid account of themselves to keep in touch with the Springboks. Unfortunately, this is another match that Gatland will have to write off to experience, as his side looks to end their losing streak against Joe Schmidt's Wallabies.

WARREN GATLAND: "We've identified certain areas where we can get a bit better, some of them came off the bench in terms of them being accurate. Because you just talked about nailing those big moments. And when you nail those big moments, then you get some reward out of it. We probably were a little bit guilty.

"There were a few opportunities for us and on attack. We didn't… we weren't quite accurate enough, and even things that people got caught out and just probably switched off a little bit. We haven't reacted and allowed them to sort of make a couple of breaks. So those are the sorts of things that we're working hard on trying to address and making sure that we are (better).