South Africa won 31-24 and De Bruin said the second half effort on defence, especially when Japan was attacking from all corners of the DHL Stadium in Cape Town, showed how determined the players were to start the tournament with a win.

“I’ll be the first to admit that we played some underwhelming rugby in patches, but we still did enough to win against a very good and organised Japanese side,” said De Bruin.

“They really got the best out of us defensively today. We did butcher some tries while on attack and some basic errors were not helping either, but overall, I am very proud of the team.”

De Bruin said the leadership of Nolusindiso Booi, who extended her record as most capped player to 47 Tests, was exceptional, while he also tipped his hat to his fellow coaches. Laurian Johannes-Haupt, Franzel September and Bafana Nhleko.

“We have only been together five weeks,” he said, “so there are still so much to do, but the fact that we could pull this one off and, in the process, improve on our world ranking, tells you a lot already.”

De Bruin's side moved past Japan on the world ranking with the win and are now looking at a top-10 position, with Tests against Australia and Italy to follow over the next two weeks.

“We have the Rugby World Cup in mind and as such, will be a work in progress for a while still,” said De Bruin.

“That said, the wins are also very important and to get the victory today is good for our momentum and confidence. Our defensive effort was close to 90%, but playing to our potential was much lower.”

Booi said the defensive effort was needed as Japan came hard and fast and tested them relentlessly.

“Since we came together, we got the better of the Barbarians, then Spain proved a handful and today Japan was very good,” said Booi.

“But the fact that we could keep them out and win tells you that we are moving in the right direction.”

Booi also praised the crowd who came out to enjoy the tournament opener: “It was great, this was a good crowd who came to watch us, and we want to thank them for doing so. We are of course very happy that we could reward them with a win, but it was hard work as Japan was not an easy opponent.”

The Springbok Women will face Australia at Athlone Stadium in Cape Town next Saturday in their second WXV 2 match.