The Springboks made four changes to their starting line-up and two more on the bench when they named the team to meet Fiji in their Pool D World Cup 2011 match in Wellington on Saturday.
Four of the six changes have been forced by injury, lock Victor Matfield (hamstring) and backs Butch James (hip flexor), Jean de Villiers (rib cartilage) and Bryan Habana (patella tendon) were all unavailable for selection due to injury. A fifth player, Johann Muller, will undergo a late fitness test on a tight hamstring. If he is unavailable he will be replaced on the bench by Francois Louw.
Matfield’s place is taken by the returning Bakkies Botha; Odwa Ndungane steps into the left wing berth in place of Habana; Pat Lambie starts at fullback with Francois Steyn moving forward to fill De Villiers’ inside centre berth and James’ place on the bench is taken by the versatile Ruan Pienaar who has appeared at scrumhalf, flyhalf and fullback for the Springboks.
In addition, Springbok coach Peter de Villiers made two tactical changes. Gurthrö Steenkamp was promoted to start at loosehead prop in place of Tendai Mtawarira (who drops to the bench) while the return to a conventional four/three split between forwards and backs among the replacements opens the way for Juan de Jongh to make a first appearance on a World Cup teamsheet.
De Villiers said Willem Alberts would act as a replacement lock if Muller failed to recover sufficiently.
“We have had injury problems at lock but we have versatile players to cover for most situations,” said De Villiers. “Danie Rossouw has now been picked to start at 4, 5, 7 and 8 this season and will call the lineouts this weekend.
“Willem Alberts is on the bench to cover four of the back five positions in the pack and we have a couple of scrumhalves on the bench who cover three other positions as well, so we are fortunate.
“Against a tough proposition like Fiji you’d prefer to have all your players available but this is tournament rugby and we picked our squad knowing that we would have to cover for many situations.”
The Springboks have played Fiji twice before, winning both games. In 1996 they recorded a 43-18 win in Pretoria before recording a momentarily tense, 37-20 victory over Fiji in the quarterfinals of the 2007 tournament.
South Africa: 15 Pat Lambie, 14 JP Pietersen, 13 Jaque Fourie, 12 Frans Steyn, 11 Odwa Ndungane, 10 Morné Steyn, 9 Fourie du Preez, 8 Pierre Spies, 7 Schalk Burger, 6 Heinrich Brüssow, 5 Danie Rossouw, 4 Bakkies Botha, 3 Jannie du Plessis, 2 John Smit (captain), 1 Gurthrö Steenkamp.
Replacements: 16 Bismarck du Plessis, 17 Tendai Mtawarira, 18 CJ van der Linde, 19 Willem Alberts, 20 François Hougaard, 21 Ruan Pienaar, 22 Juan de Jongh.
Date: Saturday 17 September
Venue: Wellington Regional Stadium, Wellington
Kick-off: 08:00 (18:00 NZ Time)
Referee: Romain Poite (France)
Assistant referees: George Clancy (Ireland), Vinny Munro (New Zealand)
TMO: Matt Goddard (Australia)
I would have started with Hougie on the wing and Pierre Spies is now going to have to do his share of lineout work, we can’t afford passengers.
Spies???????? WTF!
Is he going out with Snors daughter?
So many injuries to the players. See Butch is out injured as well.
Now really, really hoping we not playing Bakkies with a injury. We need him for later in the quarter and semi. Should not have taken a chance just yet with him. He brings so much but do we risk him against Fiji?
Also hope Lambie is 100% over his shoulder injury. Should be cause it was only a strain to the AC Joint. But also would have brought in Lambie in the Nambia game. We might need him too for later. Can’t risk any more injuries to players. We play them with slight injuries and it only makes matters worse.
Why is Hougaard not starting? For the life of me just can’t fathom that out. Odwa is a solid player won’t let the team down but we need a bit of speed I think.
Also just when I said we should have selected Mostert and probably left out Ruan. Now see Ruan on the bench. He is a good player but really not up to speed at all when he played in the away 3Nations this year. It seems to me then he is going to cover at scrummie and not Hougaard.
We don’t have cover at th either. CJ not on the bench either.
Well the selection tells me we gonna play it tight. Plenty of kicking going to come. WE need tries. Need to get the bonus point here cause Samoa and probably Wales will.
Go Bokke. Just please, please no more injuries. We are held together by bandage at the moment.
I would have liked to see Hougie start too, Pienaar is scrummie cover
Hope this ref is better than Barnes. Think the best ref in the nh is Clancy from Ireland.
@ Puma:
Howzit Oerwoudkat, long time no speak!
We should win this one, but the injury count beginning to scare me a bit, especially against this lot….we lose key players like FS and Brussouw (heaven forbids) and we are in serious shite.
(Btw, I popped into SL’s steak ranch in Cape Town last week, but he had just gone out unfortunately. Very nice place, you should really give it a try next your in town, you might even run into old Skoppie there in the vegetarian section 🙂 )
@ Pietman:6 – Howzit Piet,
How you doing? Hope well. Are you back in SA? Or was that a visit here and you back in Saudi?
When I visit Cape Town I will for sure go to SL restaurtant, but I will make sure he is there..hehe. Think he will have enjoyed to meet up with you Piet.
The injuries to our team really worries me Piet. Think this could be due to our over long S15. Also think we may be picking up injuries in training. My feeling it could be.
WE are the “Held together bandage Bokke”….. 😆
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