Western Force emerged with a second narrow win from the South African leg of their Super 14 rugby campaign, scoring an 18-16 landmark victory over the Lions in Johannesburg early on Saturday (AEDT).

Victory meant the franchise, in their third season, had finally achieved wins over all the South African teams, following a draw and a one-point loss in their two previous encounters with the Lions.

The Perth-based team scored two tries to one and overcame a 16-15 halftime deficit and the late withdrawal of Wallabies back Scott Staniforth with a knee injury suffered last week.

The Force dominated possession and territory in the second half, but sloppy execution prevented them adding to first half tries from fullback Cameron Shepherd and recent recruit Tamaiti Horua.

The visitors hit the front with a 54th minute Shepherd penalty from near halfway and held on to register two wins in South Africa for the second successive year.

The result gave the Force nine points from the three fixtures.

Skipper and lock Nathan Sharpe conceded they didn't play as well as in last week's conquest of the Cheetahs.

"Much better last week. We had a lot more line breaks and tonight we were very very sloppy in terms of the last pass going to hand," Sharpe said in his post match television interview.

"Certainly not our best performance and I think the pleasing thing for us is to get away from Africa with two wins and that's what we'll look on and build from there.

"A lot of the guys in our team have never been to Africa before and never played at Ellis park, so it's a fantastic experience and coming over here and winning two games is no mean feat."

After Lions five-eighth Louis Strydom opened the scoring with an early penalty, the Force bolted to a 15-6 lead following two well constructed tries.

Shepherd crossed after smart work by halfback James Stannard, Staniforth's replacement Scott Daruda and winger Nick Cummins.

Giteau converted and played a major part in the Forces second try after Strydom had cut the visitors lead to one point with another penalty.

The pivot's slashing run opened up the defence before passing to Horua, who took the ball overhead and plunged over in the left and corner.

The Lions scored ten straight points to edge ahead at the break.

Strydom landed a close range penalty and then converted a try to Jaco van Schalkwyk, who crossed after his centre partner Doppies la Grange charged down a Daruda clearance.

Shepherd landed the decisive penalty from over 40 metres to regain the lead for the Force, though Giteau missed with a subsequent attempt.

The West Australian side failed to convert territorial and possession advantages into further tries and appeared to catch a break eight minutes after play resumed.

New Zealand referee Kelvin Deaker may have erred in rubbing out what seemed to be a legitimate try to Lions halfback Jano Vermaak.

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