Argentina have made two changes to the starting team for the return Rugby Championship match against South Africa in Salta on Saturday.
Centre Juan Martin Hernandez, a late withdrawal from the side defeated 13-6 in Pretoria last weekend, returns at inside centre in place of Santiago Gonzalez Iglesias.
The other change is also in the backline with Lucas Gonzalez Amorosino coming in on the right wing for Horacio Agulla.
Referee Jaco Peyper gives a yellow card to Beauden Barrett of the All Blacks during the Bledisloe Cup opener
The performance of Romain Poite in this weekend’s Bledisloe Cup re-match will be under more scrutiny than ever after provocative comments from the All Blacks and Poite’s contemporary Jonathan Kaplan this week.
Kaplan, who refereed 68 Test matches, including seven Bledisloe Cup battles to become the most experienced international referee before his retirement last year, opened the batting with a defence of Jaco Peyper, who has come under fire for his officiating of the Wallabies’ 12-12 draw in Sydney last week.
Play hard on and off the field
Pearse Egan has only played rugby since the start of 2014, but even in a matter of months he has found himself transformed by the sport.
Ever since his school days, Egan has faced discrimination for his homosexuality.
“Over the years I’ve always left every group I’ve joined. Karate, scouts, basketball – not for me. I was never able to stick with anything because I never felt a part of anything,” he said.
Nick Cummins in action for the West Red Sparks and enjoying the confines of the team bus.
The eyes of Australian rugby fans will be trained on Eden Park this weekend as the Wallabies look to make history against the All Blacks.
But half a world away, the most popular player in the code will be performing away from the public glare in a relatively low-key affair at the Umakana Yokana Stadium.
Nick Cummins and his Coca Cola West Red Sparks play their season opener against Schalk Burger’s Suntory Sungoliath on Saturday.
Brad Thorn: Still going strong at 39
Brad Thorn will continue his incredible 444-game career beyond his 40th birthday with English rugby giants, Leicester.
Meanwhile another code-hopper is preparing for his own return to action with Sonny Bill Williams hoping to return for Sydney Roosters either this weekend or next.
Williams will be hoping to sign off in rugby league – for now anyway – with a second straight NRL premiership before he returns to Hamilton to re-join Super Rugby’s Chiefs.
Both Williams and Thorn are incredible cross-code stories. But who deserves the mantle as the greatest code-hopper of all time?
Lood de Jager
The Springboks made three changes to their starting XV, with two of them effecting the line-out structures – which already appeared weak in Pretoria last week.
The line-out has long been a strength of the Boks, and a lot of this dominance in the set pieces can be attributed to the maestro that is Victor Matfield.
The veteran lock was sorely missed last weekend when the Boks’ line-out struggled, in albeit poor conditions, against the Argentineans at Loftus Versfeld.
Kiwi straight-shooter Steve Hansen says the All Blacks can lift 10 or 12 notches from their Bledisloe-opening draw but doubts whether the Wallabies can rise any further.
Hansen has reacted to the 12-12 Sydney stalemate like a loss and admitted widespread criticism of his team’s poor display was wholly warranted.
He said New Zealand needed to improve “just about everything” to continue their amazing 32-Test Eden Park streak on Saturday night.
All Black coach Steve Hansen.
It was no consolation at all to All Blacks coach Steve Hansen that a post-game meeting with last week’s referee Jaco Peyper yielded a frank “mea culpa” from the South African whistle-blower.
Hansen factored a poor refereeing performance into the contributing reasons for a sub-par All Black performance in last week’s 12-12 draw with the Wallabies in Sydney to open the Rugby Championship and Bledisloe Cup series.
Sonny Bill Williams’ training session in Apia ended with the league star giving his shoes and socks to Toe Evile.
“Shoeless” Joe Jackson got his nickname during a mill game played in Greenville, South Carolina. Jackson suffered from blisters on his foot from a new pair of cleats, and they hurt so much that he had to take his shoes off before an at bat.
As play continued, a heckling fan noticed Jackson running to third base in his socks, and shouted “You shoeless son of a gun, you!” and the resulting nickname “Shoeless Joe” stuck with him throughout the remainder of his life.
Will a similar fate await Sonny Bill Williams? The Good Samaritan was also left shoeless after obliging a fan in Samoa.
Mike Brewer says if your name creeps up in All Black losses the big black marker comes out.
It was probably a good thing for Mike Brewer’s rugby career that the defeats that link him to Eden Park’s two remarkable All Blacks streaks happened far enough apart to escape much notice.
Brewer, the Pukekohe-born flanker who first made his name representing Otago, played 61 games — including 32 tests — for the All Blacks between 1986 and 1995.
A youthful Phil Kearns and David Campese showing off the World Cup in 1991.
According to those Wallabies who have played there, nothing is particularly forbidding about the graveyard of Eden Park. It’s not the sound of a hostile crowd, or the reverberation of the grandstand above the visitors’ dressing room.
The spookiest part for those in gold jumpers is the number: how many years it has been since Australia last beat the All Blacks at the famous Auckland ground.
Twenty-eight years… Boo!
Alan Jones coached the Wallabies in 1986, and he knew in the opening 20 minutes of the third and deciding Test of the series that his Wallabies were about to carve out their own slice of Bledisloe Cup history.
“I knew they would throw the kitchen sink at us,” Jones recalls. “I picked up that vibe by my contacts around the pubs and so on.”
Referee Chris Linwood from UAE during a match officials’ session at TOP in Stellenbosch
One of the key presentations at the IRB’s Talent Optimisation Programme (TOP) in Stellenbosch, South Africa, recently was entitled “Where is rugby going?” and it’s a safe bet that the simple answer to that question is “onwards and upwards”, in no small way thanks to courses such as this one.
The ninth edition of the TOP just concluded, hosted for the eighth time by the Stellenbosch Academy of Sport, about 50km east of Cape Town, and situated in an historic rugby centre. It targets coaches, trainers and match officials from unions that don’t have their own high-performance programme.
From the fringe to centre stage, Ryan Crotty will start his first test for the All Blacks in Saturday’s rematch with the Wallabies at Eden Park.
After seven cameos from the bench in the past 12 months, which included scoring the match-winning try against Ireland to seal last year’s prefect season, Crotty now gets the chance to push his case in a big occasion.
Juan Smith will complete a remarkable return to international rugby when he runs out for the Springboks against Argentina in Salta on Saturday, in the Springboks’ second Test of The Rugby Championship (kick-off 21:40 SA Time).
Smith’s inclusion at flank is one of three changes to the starting 15, with a further four changes on the bench.
Gurthrö Steenkamp (prop) and Eben Etzebeth (lock) will start in the tight five, with Tendai Mtawarira and Bakkies Botha moving to the bench. Marcell Coetzee will join them amongst the replacements after coming in as a late substitute for the injured Willem Alberts last weekend.
IT starts at Auckland airport customs and grows from there.
When Wallaby great Tim Horan closes his eyes and thinks of the infamous Eden Park curse, he recalls an aura that assaults your senses long before you lace on your boots.
“It starts from the time you arrive at customs in Auckland,” Horan said of Australia’s winless streak there since 1986.
In a bid to add more grunt up front, the EP Kings coach Carlos Spencer has made four changes to the pack for Saturday’s Currie Cup match against the Blue Bulls in Pretoria.
“We have brought back players like Steven Sykes and Darron Nell to add some physicality up front – which is something we lacked against the Lions and really need against this Bulls outfit,” Spencer said on Wednesday.
Head coach Allister Coetzee has named an unchanged line-up for Saturday’s top-of-the-log Absa Currie Cup clash between DHL Western Province and the Xerox Golden Lions at DHL Newlands (kick-off 17:05 SA Time).
Hookers Tiaan Liebenberg (back) and Scarra Ntubeni (calf muscle) remain sidelined, meaning Stephan Coetzee continues in the No 2 jersey with Neil Rautenbach again warming the bench.
Brendan Venter
While the atrocious weather conditions played a significant role in a low-scoring affair at Loftus Versfeld, I believe Argentina underlined their notoriety as the most negative side in world rugby in every single area of play.
Not only were they cynical in conceding a plethora of penalties, the way they scrummed, contested the line-outs and mauls, and the number of off-the-ball incidents – in my view the most cowardice of acts – was infuriating to behold.
I would suggest that the underhand tactics employed by the visitors during the match were entirely pre-planned, with talk of embracing a new era and playing “more rugby” a well-rehearsed ruse.
Tony Johnson
I’m not sure I can remember a game from South Africa in which it rained so heavily. We get a fair bit of that in New Zealand, but Pretoria? Is this global warming in action?
And Sydney turned on a bit of a shocker for the first Bledisloe Cup test, contributing to an error-ridden, penalty infested stalemate.
The Springboks will be happy to get out of a tricky game with a win, and they’re the only team to have one of those right now!
In the 1980’s people sat spellbound in front of their television screens watching a show called MacGyver. Every week the hero would somehow find himself in a predicament and escape using sparse items in the process.
It would seem as if Blue Bulls loosehead prop MacGyver Dean Greyling has lived up to his name this week after he was suspended for only one week when he was found guilty of foul play in the Currie Cup match between the Blue Bulls and the Golden Lions on Saturday 9 August in Johannesburg.
Former All Black Chris Jack is building a new career.
In his heyday, former lock Chris Jack was accustomed to being lifted in countless lineouts. These days, he’s the one doing the heavy lifting.
The 35-year-old has taken up a building apprenticeship, a move which saw him hang up the boots after 14 years of professional rugby.
“It’s rewarding but it’s a big learning curve having not done much outside of school except professional rugby,” Jack says.
Ewen McKenzie
Ewen McKenzie has stuck solid with his Wallaby side from the opening Bledisloe Cup clash to prevent dual droughts continuing in Auckland; a twelfth year without the prized trophy, and a 29th without victory at Eden Park.
But aside from on-field personnel, the Wallabies coach has continued to tinker with many of the team’s preparation and behavioural habits to snap both hoodoos against the All Blacks.
Though individually small, the changes are designed to add up to the Wallabies psychologically breaking the shackles of a long-run of defeat against New Zealand.
Derrick Minnie has been entrusted to take over the Lion’s captaincy from Warren Whiteley
Derrick Minnie will reclaim the Golden Lions’ captaincy armband when they head to Cape Town for a top-of-the-table Currie Cup clash with Western Province.
The Lions, who top the table on points difference ahead of WP, will head to Newlands without regular skipper Warren Whitely – who was called up to the Springbok squad in place of the injured loose forward Willem Albert, for the Test against Argentina in Salta on Saturday.
The Springboks have landed in Argentina with no injury concerns, but Meyer will be forced to ponder the likes of fit-again Pat Lambie and Juan Smith.
Having come away from the wet and wild Loftus Versfeld with only an injury before the game to Willem Alberts, Meyer will have a full compliment to pick from when they play Argentina in Salta.
Meyer has now picked up Lions captain Warren Whiteley as cover for Alberts who is staying at home alongside Victor Matfield.
Brad Thorn: Still going strong at 39
Leicester Tigers have confirmed the arrival of World Cup-winning former All Black second row Brad Thorn.
39-year-old New Zealander was referred to by Tigers director of rugby Richard Cockerill as “one of the great all-time rugby players the world has ever seen.” He is expected at the club at the end of September.
Thorn became the first player to win World Cup, Super Rugby and Heineken Cup titles and arrives from the Highlanders having previously represented the Crusaders and Leinster.
“He is a very driven individual,” Cockerill told the Leicester Mercury.
“He wants to play in the Premiership and he wants to win the Premiership.”
Western Province, for the first time in almost two seasons, came away from a match without an injury following their 41-17 win over the Blue Bulls in their Currie Cup match at Newlands, in Cape Town, on Saturday.
Province coach Allister Coetzee said the entire match-day squad over the weekend had indeed emerged injury-free.
Province, and their Super Rugby side, the Stormers, had been picking up a variety of injuries almost without fail in the past two seasons.
The Cell C Sharks had to revert to what they know, as the forwards rumbled them to victory in the second half of their opening home Absa Currie Cup game against the Steval Pumas, but the coaches appear to be taking the glass half full view to their start to the season.
According to reports, with the big battering rams that dictated a forward based approach during the Super Rugby season now either injured, with the Springboks or departed for Japan, the young Sharks coaches who have taken over for the domestic competition have spoken about the need to play to different strengths.
Frans Steyn wil nie n “GELDJAGTER” genoem word nie.
”Ek is nie ’n kind nie.”
Só het Frans Steyn glo op die laaste krisisvergadering tussen hom en die Suid-Afrikaanse Rugbyunie (SARU) gesê voordat hy opgestaan, uitgeloop en die Springbok-groep vaarwel geroep het.
Dit was nadat meer as een vergadering tussen hom en SARU oor sy terugkeer uit Frankryk skipbreuk gely het.
SARU het aanvanklik in 2012 skriftelik ingestem om Steyn se kontrak met ’n Franse bemarkingsmaatskappy uit te koop sodat hy weer heeltyds vir Suid-Afrika beskikbaar kon wees. SARU het die paaiemente daarvoor stiptelik betaal – tot in Januarie 2013 toe betalings skielik eensydig gestaak is.
Gary Botha (L) and Ian McIntosh (R) pose with students from Waterkloof high school in Pretoria
The Webb Ellis Cup has completed its first day in South Africa as part of the fifth leg of the Rugby World Cup Trophy Tour.
On August 18 the Trophy visited Hoerskool Waterkloof in Pretoria where children from the school, along with groups from St Peters, Pretoria Technical High School and Elarduspark got to show off their Rugby playing skills in a coaching clinic which was led by former South Africa coach Ian McIntosh and Rugby World Cup 2007 winner Gary Botha.
Land Rover supports a number of schools through its South African dealer network – a total of 31 dealers who support local schools within their communities.
When the Springboks finished off their 2013 campaign with a victory over France in Paris, coach Heyneke Meyer spoke about the need for South African rugby to undergo revolutionary change in order to close the gap that the All Blacks enjoyed when it came to conditioning and mental strength.
At the start of the 2014 Castle Lager Rugby Championship, he continued the theme of revolution, this time talking about the need to bring greater intensity and tempo to the Bok game, to be able to out-think opponents now that the days of bludgeoning opposition with physicality are in the past.
Jannie du Plessis & Tendai ‘Beast’ Mtawarira
The Springboks missed an ideal opportunity to put the pressure on New Zealand and Australia after the latter two sides drew 12-all in the first game of this year’s Rugby Championship at the Olympic Stadium in Sydney on Saturday.
To say the unseasonal Loftus monsoon made constructive rugby extremely difficult is an understatement, but one would like to believe that the Boks should have played the situation much better than Saturday’s 13-6 victory in their opener against Argentina in Pretoria.
The SA Schools selectors have retained only two players and made a further two positional changes for the team’s second outing of the 2014 Under 18 International Series against Wales on Tuesday, 19 August in George.
The SA Schools outplayed France 28-13 while England managed to secure a last gap 24-21 victory over Wales in the earlier match. The other teams taking part in the annual junior international series are England, France and Italy.
The opening fixtures took placed last Friday 15 August at City Park in Cape Town and the action now moves to Outeniqua Park in George before the final matches at Paul Roos Markötter Stadium in Stellenbosch on Saturday, 23 August.
The three players who will start in their second match are right wing Andell Loubser, inside centre IT Jackson and lock Eduard Zandberg.
Romain Poite, the most influential Frenchman since Inspector Clouseau
IF Wallabies fans were dismayed by the whistle-happy performance of referee Jaco Peyper last weekend, they will be equally alarmed to hear that Frenchman Romain Poite is in charge of Saturday’s Bledisloe Cup return bout in Auckland.
Poite controlled last year’s big third Test defeat to the British & Irish Lions in a game in which the Wallabies front row was hammered by the referee.
Wallabies coach Ewen McKenzie has named an unchanged line-up for Saturday’s Bledisloe Cup encounter, convinced the team that drew 12-all in the series opener in Sydney can topple the All Blacks at their Eden Park fortress.
McKenzie resisted calls to reinstate Bernard Foley at five-eighth to retain Kurtley Beale as Australia’s chief playmaker as the Wallabies bid to break their 28-year drought in Auckland.
Beale had an influential game in the first Test, kicking all of Australia’s points and McKenzie is backing the mercurial match-winner to continue sparking the Wallabies attack in more favourable conditions this weekend.
Driven: Agustín Creevy
Argentina captain Agustín Creevy is targeting revenge against South Africa after his men’s narrow defeat in Pretoria.
A far cry from the 73-13 thrashing suffered by Argentina in 2013, Creevy’s team pushed the Springboks all the way in horrendous conditions at Loftus.
Enjoying the upper hand in the scrum, Creevy underlined the dissatisfaction with the result after coming so close to a first ever win over South Africa.
“We are not happy, because we couldn’t get a try [in the dying minutes] and because we lost,” said Creevy.
“We are a group that works hard and will make the sacrifices we need to the revenge in Salta.”