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Jacques Botes carried off the field on the shoulders of his Barbarians team mates
Jacques Botes getting ready to take the conversion of his own try.. to end off his career
Jacques Botes marked his final game with a try and conversion as the Barbarians dazzled to beat Leicester Tigers 59-26 in a 13-try feast on Tuesday.
The attendance at Welford Road was 11,169 – all who witnessed Springbok discard Juan de Jongh showing great sportsmanship to gift Botes the final try of the match in what was the veteran’s last game of a splendid career.
Both sides played some attractive, free-flowing rugby and the crowd lapped it up.
Despite a late first-half comeback by the Tigers, to close the gap from 0-21 to 19-21 at the break, the BaaBaas put on a display of fine entertainment to outscore the home team by nine tries to four in a game that marked the famous invitation club’s 125-year celebrations.
But the Barbarians showed their class in the second period and ran riot with their Super Rugby-led backline leading the way with a mixture of pace and power.
It’s PUB NIGHT!
Whooopie!
it’s been a better start to the week for me, but still bloody busy… need some serious R & R tonight!
The End Of Year Tours, or in South Africa’s case, The Castle Outgoing Tour, starts this weekend… against Ireland, the SIX Nations champions.
The Springboks have had a good chance to get all their ducks in a row this time round and proper preparation time, with the contracted Springboks out of the latter stages of the Currie Cup, so no excuses, we want some good performances on tour!
OK, let’s focus on the PUB tonight…. the idea with PUB NIGHT is to lighten up our dull Tuesday evenings with music, comedy and fun.
Rugby takes a backseat tonight as the clan and fellow rugby nutters gather…
Read the rules below carefully, or you WILL get burnt!
Just for clarity sake, when someone does not adhere to the Rules of the PUB, EVERYBODY jumps on them and pummels them, right… understood?
Here’s how it works:
Ruan Pienaar
Eben Etzebeth
A bright sunshiny but chilly day greeted the Springboks when they arrived in Dublin on Sunday, where they kick off the Castle Lager Outgoing Tour against Ireland this weekend.
The South Africans left Johannesburg last night and travelled via London Heathrow to the Irish capital for their first visit to this part of the world in two years.
Eben Etzebeth stayed behind in South Africa and will join the squad on Tuesday following a family bereavement, while there will be more clarity on Ruan Pienaar’s fitness situation in the week.
A 24-man DHL Western Province squad will leave Cape Town for London on Thursday, as the 2014 ABSA Currie Cup champions get set to take on top English club Saracens in the Sanlam Private Investments Challenge this coming weekend.
DHL WP won their second ABSA Currie Cup title in three years less than two weeks ago and they are now preparing to face up to last season’s European Cup and Premiership runners-up on their home turf at Allianz Park in North London on Sunday.
Sixteen members of the victorious DHL WP matchday squad from two Saturdays ago will make the trip to take on Saracens, with new forward signings Bongi Mbonambi, Vincent Koch and Wilco Louw joining the likes of Oli Kebble, Jurie van Vuuren, Dillyn Leyds, Pat Howard and EW Viljoen in the selection mix.
Bryan & Bernie Habana
Bernie Habana, the father of Springbok wing Bryan, is reported to be causing his landlord problems by not paying his rent.
According to the Times Live website, Habana snr has not paid his rent for months and is now refusing to leave the R2.4m house he is occupying in Johannesburg’s northern suburbs, according to his landlord, Thorsten Weiss.
Weiss is taking Habana to the Gauteng Rental Housing Tribunal this week to get an eviction order.
Stuart Lancaster
As England’s injuries continue to stack up ahead of Saturday’s game with world champions New Zealand, coach Stuart Lancaster says his side have been the victims of “bad luck” after the loss of several forwards.
With regular forwards Alex Corbisiero, Mako Vunipola, Tom Youngs, Dan Cole and Geoff Parling already out of this month’s Test matches, second row Joe Launchbury has become the latest to withdraw due to a neck problem.
Northampton backs Luther Burrell and Stephen Myler have also been ruled out of the Twickenham match against the All Blacks.
Jonathan Sexton
Irish flyhalf Johnny Sexton looks set to make a full recovery in time to face the Springboks in Dublin on Saturday, after suffering a thigh injury in Racing Metro’s match against Oyonnax last weekend.
Sexton was forced from the field in the Top 14 game, with Metro’s coach Laurent Labit describing his injury as a ‘tweak’.
However, Ireland team manager Mick Kearney dismissed concerns and said the playmaker would be available on Saturday.
“It was intended that Johnny Sexton would only play a portion of the game for Racing on Saturday so he played 40 minutes and he came off,” said Kearney.
Ryan Grant
Ryan Grant, the 18-times capped Glasgow Warriors prop, has been invited to train with Scotland for year-end Tests, as an injury replacement for Edinburgh’s Allan Dell.
Dell sustained a leg injury in last Friday’s Pro12 match against Leinster at the RDS in Dublin.
He was assessed at St Vincent’s University Hospital in Dublin and returned the next day to Edinburgh with the rest of the team.
Napolioni Nalaga
Clermont wing Napolioni Nalaga will miss Fiji’s November Tests against France, Wales and the United States due to family reasons, Fiji coach John McKee told AFP.
The prolific 28-year-old has scored nine tries in 16 internationals for Fiji, but won’t be adding to that this month.
“He expressed that he didn’t want to be considered for this tour,” said McKee.
“That is his decision, he had some family things to attend to. I respect that.”
Singapore clinched a four-year deal to host a leg of the IRB Sevens World Series at its state-of-the-art new National Stadium, starting next year, a media report said.
The Straits Times said the Singapore Rugby Union signed a host union agreement with the International Rugby Board last week.
It will join Vancouver and Paris as new entrants to the nine-nation, eight-month global campaign, with Tokyo, Las Vegas and Glasgow making way, the report said, without naming a source.
USA Eagles (6) 6 / 74 (43) All Blacks (Final Score)
The United States of America’s Eagles and New Zealand All Blacks did battle in the End Of Year Tours at
Soldier Field, Chicago at 22:00 SA Time (15:00 Chicago Time, 20:00 GMT, 09:00 Sunday NZ Time).
This was the live match discussion Article.
The match was broadcast LIVE on SuperSport 1 CSN on TV in SA.
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Barbarians (12) 36 / 40 (14) Wallabies (Final Score)
The Barbarians and the Australian Wallabies did battle in the End Of Year Tours at
Twickenham Stadium, London at 16:30 SA Time (14:30 GMT & BST).
This was the live match discussion Article.
The match was broadcast LIVE on SuperSport 1 & CSN on TV in SA.
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Hi fellow Rugby-Talkers, readers and rugby nutters,
Yesterday we went well over the 12 Million Page Impressions mark here on Rugby-Talk.com, since we started counting on 31 October 2009 (exactly 5 years ago today).
To some it may be irrelevant, but it is a real world indication of how we have grown and how we are capturing the rugby audience all over the globe. It is an indication that we are successful in what we are doing on this wonderful rugby portal and it certainly is indicative that we keep growing… and growing on a serious exponential curve.
The sport we so gladly serve, makes it easier to reach these figures, but as we have seen from recent rivals who have fallen by the wayside, it still indicates that you have to do things right and not just sit back and expect people to access your site because you think that you are somebody or that the rugby world owes you something.
At the end of the 2014 calendar year we should reach a figure of 4.75 Million Page Impressions for the year… or more, a massive increase on the 2013 calendar year.
John McFarand
Conditions in the Northern Hemisphere may differ significantly from those at home but Springbok assistant coach John McFarland believed they favoured the South African players.
“Ellis Park is obviously much quicker and there’s a fatigue factor that always kicks in, whereas in the Northern Hemisphere, it’s a little bit slower and you need bigger guys in terms of the hitting,” McFarland said in Johannesburg on Friday.
“South African players are very successful in the Premiership under those conditions and if you look at how many are playing well in the European clubs, and are valued highly, it’s certainly because those conditions suit us.”
The Springbok squad departs for Dublin on Saturday ahead of their four-Test outgoing tour starting with a clash against Six Nations champions Ireland.
Brendan Venter
John Smit has defined the role that Brendan Venter will play at the Sharks with the former Saracens Director of Rugby coming in once a week as a technical advisor.
Smit’s big appointments since his former World Cup-winning coach Jake White walked out has been to bring in two men who coached the CEO during his playing career – Gary Gold, who was assistant coach to Peter de Villiers and Venter, who coached him at Saracens.
Gold has been installed as the hands-on head coach of the Sharks and will be assisted by the three Currie Cup coaches in Brad Macleod-Henderson, Paul Anthony and Sean Everitt.
Venter will be adding technical support and advice with Smit hoping to tap into his ‘intellectual property’ of how the game works.
“Brendan will provide intellectual property in terms of where the game is going, discussing trends and helping with detail,” Smit told the Sharks website..
“He will come in once a week depending on the emphasis of the skill-set for that week.
Clarke Dermody
Former Southland and All Black prop, Clarke Dermody has been unveiled as the Highlanders’ scrum and assistant forwards’ coach for the 2015 Super Rugby season.
He had a voluntary, part-time role with the Highlanders this year, before serving as an assistant with Southland during the national provincial championships.
Dermody had a remarkable playing career, which included playing for every New Zealand age-group team before playing three Tests in 2006 for the All Blacks and is no stranger to the Highlanders after representing them 44 times.
Highlanders coach Jamie Joseph hopes the fulltime work by Dermody will help shore up a scrum that was put under pressure this season.
Doppies la Grange
Gideon “Doppies” la Grange has brought the curtain down on his career after a short return stint in the Currie Cup for the Griquas.
The 32-year-old returned to South Africa via Kimberley after playing in Italy for Benetton Treviso in 2013 where he only made nine appearances.
La Grange states the reason for his retirement is that his body was sending him signals.
Wallabies backrower Matt Hodgson will be given the honour of captaining Australia in Saturday’s opening match of the 2014 Spring Tour against the Barbarians at Twickenham.
New head coach Michael Cheika has given Hodgson the responsibility of leading a team which boasts 495 Test caps in the starting line-up, and which also includes four players who will wear the green and gold jersey for the first time in 2014.
The clash against the Barbarians is an uncapped international, although will see playmakers Quade Cooper and Will Genia, winger Henry Speight and backrower Sean McMahon receive their first opportunities for Australia this year.
An extended nine-man bench has also been named for the clash with one player to be omitted following Thursday afternoon’s training session in London.
Cheika said the team was looking forward to the opportunity on Saturday.
Craig Joubert
South Africa’s Craig Joubert will be in Chicago this Saturday when he referees the Test between the United States and New Zealand.
Joubert was the referee in last weekend’s Currie Cup final between Western Province and the Golden Lions at Newlands. He received high praise for the way in which he handled the game and this week his reward is a trip to the United States.
The Eagles play the All Blacks at the Soldiers Field, the home ground of gridiron club Chicago Bears, which seats 61 500 and is sold out.
Meanwhile, other South African referee in action this weekend is Jaco Peyper, who will take charge of the Barbarians v Australia game at Twickenham in London.
The All Blacks team to play the United States has been named with selectors unveiling a team combining young talent and experienced heads for the historic match at Soldier Field, Chicago.
The match this Saturday 1 November is a 61 500 capacity sell-out, with the All Blacks playing in front of a record attendance for a rugby match in the USA.
All Blacks: 15 Israel Dagg, 14, Cory Jane, 13 Ryan Crotty, 12 Sonny Bill Williams, 11 Charles Piutau, 10 Aaron Cruden, 9 TJ Perenara, 8 Kieran Read (Captain), 7 Sam Cane, 6 Victor Vito, 5 Patrick Tuipulotu, 4 Jeremy Thrush, 3 Charlie Faumuina, 2 Nathan Harris, 1 Joe Moody
Replacements: 16 Keven Mealamu, 17 Wyatt Crockett, 18 Ben Franks, 19 Brodie Retallick, 20 Liam Messam, 21 Augustine Pulu, 22 Daniel Carter, 23 Julian Savea.
Todd Clever
Making his 60th appearance in an Eagles shirt, Todd Clever will captain the side from No.6 alongside Scott Lavalla. The flanks will go up against Victor Vito and Sam Cane from the All Blacks.
Three English Premiership stars – Eric Fry, Samu Manoa, and Hayden Smith – make up the tight five.
Phil Thiel, who spent time with Saracens earlier this year before being chosen for the Eagles Select XV in the 2014 IRB Americas Rugby Championship, will sit between Fry and Olive Kilifi in the scrum.
Danny Barrett will make his third start and earn his fourth Eagles cap at No.8 in front of veteran Mike Petri at scrum half.
The Maori All Blacks team to take on Japan in Kobe in the first match of its 2014 tour has been named and features 10 new caps.
Coach Colin Cooper said he was pleased with how quickly the team had gelled given the short assembly time with most of the 27 strong squad only coming together last weekend.
“Many players have come off a pretty intense few weekends of rugby so we’ve been mindful to not over-burden them,” he said.
Marius Jonker
South African referee Marius Jonker has announced his retirement from top-level refereeing.
The 46-year-old refereed a Test between Namibia and Germany in Windhoek on Wednesday night and after the final whistle confirmed that he had retired from first class refereeing and that it was his last match in charge.
Wilco Louw
DHL Western Province and the DHL Stormers will be losing an entire, highly rated, front row but they already have an exciting replacement trio lined up.
The three front row forwards that have brought down the curtain on their careers in the Western Cape are Pat Cilliers and Brok Harris, who are heading abroad, and Tiaan Liebenberg who has retired from the game.
However, whilst three warhorses depart Cape Town, the Stormers had already announced the signing of powerful Bulls hooker Bongi Mbonambi earlier this year, with highly-rated SA Under-20 tighthead prop Wilco Louw also making the move down to the Cape from Pretoria ahead of next year.
Alastair Kellock will lead the Barbarians against Australia at Twickenham on Saturday.
The former Scotland captain takes charge of a cosmopolitan squad, coached by Sir John Kirwan, for the Killik Cup match.
In the starting side are Australia wing Nick Cummins, who lines up against his former team-mates, with New Zealand’s Bledisloe Cup match winner Colin Slade at flyhalf.
Hi,
We have NEW SuperBru Pools for all to join!
The HSBC Sevens World Series of 2014 / 2015 starts this weekend on Saturday, so hurry up and do not delay to register for it, and after registering, make your picks for this weekend’s games!
The End Of Year Tours or November Internationals as it is also known is a few weeks away still, nevertheless register now, while the iron is hot!
As is usual, Rugby-Talk.com’s SuperBru Pools are open for ALL REGISTERED SUBSCRIBERS of Rugby-Talk.com, so if you are not yet registered here on Rugby-Talk.com, do so without delay! It is so easy to register and such fun to discuss rugby here.
Heyneke Meyer
Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer has warned his team they will need to be at their best if they are to keep their unbeaten record under his management in the Northern Hemisphere intact.
Meyer singled out the team’s first fixture against Ireland as a crucial one to kick off the team’s four week tour, and one which is the most tricky of all their fixtures.
While England has been singled out before as the fixture the Boks are likely to hold in the highest esteem, especially with next year’s Rugby World Cup being played there, the Boks know they cannot focus on the Twickenham showdown before getting past the tricky Irish, who have been a team that has plagued them at this time of year under previous coaches.
The Boks didn’t play Ireland when they went north last year, but the Irish will still be smarting from coming amazingly close to beating the All Blacks in Dublin last year, as the New Zealanders snatched the game away from them in the dying seconds to end their season unbeaten.
In preparation for Super Rugby in 2015, all 5 New Zealand Super Rugby franchises have named their squads for the tournament.
In the meantime, South African franchises will ponder about their squads and in December we at Rugby-Talk.com will speculate what the South African franchises will look like, as final squads will only be known in January 2015.
The same happens every year, New Zealand and Australia get their ducks in a row before the December break, whereas the South Africans seem to focus on December holidays, going to the beach, having Christmas and generally geting fat and lazy.
When can we ever expect the South African Rugby Union (SARU) and the South African Super Rugby franchises to ever catch up to the more professional attitudes displayed primarily by New Zealand… but also closely followed by their Antipodion counterparts, Australia?
As the Springboks gather in Johannesburg before making their way to the Northern Hemisphere, Ireland head coach Joe Schmidt is well aware of the challenge he faces against the 2007 World Champions.
“South Africa do loom large,” he said.
“I don’t know if there’s been a better player in the world this year than Duane Vermeulen. I think he’s been unbelievable and we know so many of their other players.
“I was down at the Junior World Cup and watched flyhalf Handre Pollard, as a young fella playing in that final against England and he is an impressive young player, an impressive physical ball-carrier, he’s a big kid.
“So, there’s the new and old there and they have got a great mix and they’ll be very tough.”
Michael Cheika
New Wallaby defence coach Nathan Grey believes Australia can turn around their disastrous 2014 campaign if they get it right in the top six inches.
The Wallabies get their five-match year-end tour underway when they take on the Barbarians at Twickenham on Saturday.
While the emphasis is often on entertainment in BaaBaas games, it is when they take on Wales, France, Ireland and England in the following weeks that the heat will be turned up on a Wallaby team in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons.
Grey said the challenge for the Wallabies was to have a winning mentality.
England suffered another injury blow on Tuesday when head coach Stuart Lancaster confirmed centre Luther Burrell is unlikely to be fit for the upcoming test against New Zealand after sustaining a hand injury.
Northampton centre Burrell suffered an injury to his right hand during his side’s European Champions Cup victory over the Ospreys last weekend and will see a specialist ahead of New Zealand’s visit to Twickenham on November 8.
“I think it would be tight for New Zealand, if I’m being honest,” Lancaster told a news conference.
“He’s not been in camp this week at all. He’s seeing the specialist and it will probably unfold over the weekend.
Tim Swiel
Cell C Sharks back, Tim Swiel will play for Harlequins Rugby Club in the UK on loan for four months. He joined the team on Saturday and will return to Durban at the end of February 2015.
“This is a fantastic opportunity for Tim and I am certain that this experience at a top club will provide him with great memories and will bode well for him in the future”, said The Sharks CEO, John Smit.
Tim Swiel added: “I am looking forward to playing for Harlequins Rugby Club for a few months during the Cell C Sharks off-season.
Julian Redelinghuys
Robbie Coetzee
Jaco Kriel
Nizaam Carr
Seabelo Senatla
Five newcomers and two returnees have been added to the bulk of the Springboks’ Castle Lager Rugby Championship squad as the national selectors opted for continuity and rewarding form in naming a 36-man squad for next month’s tour to the Northern Hemisphere.
Twenty-nine of the 36 players named for the Castle Lager Outgoing Tour were part of the Rugby Championship squad. They will be joined by the uncapped quintet of Robbie Coetzee, Julian Redelinghuys, Nizaam Carr, Jaco Kriel and Seabelo Senatla, while Coenie Oosthuizen and Johan Goosen have been recalled to the squad for the tour of four Tests.
“It’s wonderful to have this kind of continuity in selection, while the five uncapped players in the squad have all been rewarded for superb form throughout the season,” said Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer.
“Many of the selected players were at our training camp in Stellenbosch last week where we put in a lot of very hard work. We’ll have to hit the ground running when we assemble in Johannesburg on Wednesday before we depart on what will be a challenging tour.
It’s PUB NIGHT again… and what a shocking start to the week for me it was, have not even had time to change my mind, let alone put deserved news on Rugby-Talk.
Tonight it changes, I WILL catch up on the rugby news, even if it is the last thing I do!
Rugby-Talk.cm quietly reaches milestone after milestone and today Bullscot officially took us over the 11 000 mark, as far as news articles are concerned!
Tomorrow will see us reach 12 Million Page Impressions since we started counting on 31 October 2009 and at year end in 2014 we should stand at over 12.75 Million Page Impressions.
The ABSA Currie Cup concluded this past weekend, with DHL Western Province walking away with the spoils fopr 2014. Congratulations to Province, deserved winners after a stellar Currie Cup season. Heartfelt congratulations also goes out to the Xerox Golden Lions who came oh so close to forcing the game into overtime. All in all a good final!
OK, let’s focus on the PUB tonight…. the idea with PUB NIGHT is to lighten up our dull Tuesday evenings with music, comedy and fun.
Rugby takes a backseat tonight as the clan and fellow rugby nutters gather…
Read the rules below carefully, or you WILL get burnt!
Just for clarity sake, when someone does not adhere to the Rules of the PUB, EVERYBODY jumps on them and pummels them, right… understood?
Here’s how it works:
South Africa has set themselves the ultimate benchmark, beating none other than the All Blacks during their last outing, and the pieces very much seem to be falling into place for Heyneke Meyer’s Springboks.
It has been heady stuff for the second ranked Test nation, playing impressive attack, while their relentless carpet bombing of the ruck contest has been driven by the Meyer tendency to pick giants in the back row – and this has been a key area of their ability to match New Zealand.
This is a template that the team will only look to develop, while their squad balance is remarkably similar to their great rivals, with Meyer introducing new talent to complement some of the most experienced players in his country’s history.