Springboks believe they are on the right track despite losing streak

The Boks have suffered back-to-back defeats against the two top-ranked sides in the world, Ireland and France, but are confident their preparations for next year's World Cup are proceeding apace.

Both defeats could easily have been victories had one or two moments in the matches gone their way, and Springbok assistant coach Deon Davids and lock Salmaan Moerat feel the team has grown as a unit and learned a lot from both results, which will stand them in good stead in their matches to come against Italy and England.

"We are definitely on the right road," said Moerat. "In rugby, one tends to look at the results but looking at the way the pack and backline played last week we are relatively happy.

"As a team, we got good answers from those matches. We executed the game plan well and for most of the match we did really well. Losing is never nice, but one always learns a little more when you lose," he added.

"We know our plan and we are following our processes, and although the next two weeks are going to be very challenging, we will continue to back what we are doing and hopefully get the results."

Davids added: "We certainly got a lot of answers and from a playing perspective and we will continue with our processes. We have big belief in our squad. We know where we need to improve to get the reward for our efforts in the next two weeks."

Davids also revealed that Pieter-Steph du Toit would have a disciplinary hearing on Tuesday after his red card against France for a dangerous clean-out at a ruck and said they would adapt their plans accordingly.

"Pieter-Steph has a disciplinary hearing tomorrow (on Tuesday) and as coaches we will adapt to the outcome of that," he said.

"We know it was not his intention to go into contact like that, and it would be a bonus to have him available for the Test, but we'll let the process unfold first."

The Boks arrived in the Italian port city of Genoa late on Sunday afternoon after making the trip from Toulon by bus, and with the squad settled in, they kicked off their on-field preparations on Monday.

"Italy are a good side with proper systems in place and they come a long way with their coach," Davids added.

"They have also had a few good results. They beat Wales away, and they beat Australia last weekend. They also defeated us in 2016, so we have to pitch up with the right mindset.

"We are expecting a physical game from them, and looking closely at their side, they have a good pack that will challenge us in the lineouts, scrums and mauls and they are also very good defensively, so we need to be on our A game."