Eastern Province Kings coach Carlos Spencer’s named Luke Watson as the captain ahead of Friday’s clash with Western Province at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth.
Spencer also included experienced players like Tim Whitehead, Ronnie Cooke and David Bulbring to add stability to a side in which many players will be having their first taste of the Currie Cup Premier Division.
In the front row, prop Lizo Gqoboka has been bracketed with BG Uys, but Spencer was confident Gqoboka would take his place in the starting line-up.
Experienced lock Steven Sykes is also on the sidelines at this stage, with Spencer saying he needed a bit more game time after an injury layoff.
World Cup winning prop CJ van der Linde is on the bench, alongside Junior Boks No 8 Aidon Davis.
EP Kings: 15 Scott van Breda, 14 Ronnie Cooke, 13 Tim Whitehead, 12 Shane Gates, 11 Siviwe Soyizwapi, 10 Gary van Aswegen, 9 Tobie Botes, 8 Luke Watson (Captain), 7 Stefan Willemse, 6 Thembelani Bholi, 5 David Bulbring, 4 Steven Cummins, 3 Tom Botha, 2 Edgar Marutlulle, 1 Lizo Gqoboka / BG Uys
Replacements: 16 Albe de Swardt, 17 CJ van der Linde, 18 Darron Nell, 19 Aidon Davis, 20 Kevin Luiters, 21 George Whitehead, 22 Ntabeni Dukisa.
Expect the Kings to hold their own after a few weeks, especially in PE.
May be more difficult away from home.
Undoubtedly they’ll take a few heavy beatings, but that’s to be expected.
The goal for King Carlos and his charges will be to beat the lies of Griquas and the Pumas. If they can achieve that, win one or two other games against the tide, and avoid the wooden spoon, they will in all likelihood claim the campaign to be a success.
A fair team .. it will be interesting to see how Gary vA does against his old team. He has more rugby in his little finger than the Cat has in his whole body but sadly he is a brittle walking sicknote.
Luke W versus Carr will also be very interesting.. Carr could be devastating as a free roaming linking number 8 and I expect him to create havoc from that position at CC level.
robzim wrote:
Two not dissimilar players if one compares Carr today to Like when in his prime (for me when he was at Bath).
I think Carr will have the upper edge. I reckon he could well become a legend in the National colours if given the opportunity.
Luke has become something of “a brittle walking sicknote” in recent times. (Somethin in the Algoabaai water?)
@ robzim:
I agree.. Watson was indeed very similar to Carr in playing style when he was younger… Carr perhaps has the edge as far as straight running speed is concerned while Luke was perhaps a bit more abrasive. Very similar skill set though, both very good at offloading and linking. The one thing that might count against Carr is his relative lack of size as we all know HM prefers big loosies.
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