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The Boks are back baby!

Rassie Erasmus has announced the Springbok team for the 2024 season, and tapped Pieter-Steph Du Toit to lead the boys during Saturday’s Test against Wales at Twickenham. Du Toit only led the Boks once before, also against Wales in Washington in 2018 – a Test the Boks lost 22-20.

This will be the first test the Springboks play since whipping the All Blacks in last year’s Rugby World Cup.

The 23-man line-up for the Boks will include four uncapped ‘newbies’; flyhalf Jordan Hendrikse and winger Edwill van der Merwe – to start, and Stormers pair – lock Ben-Jason Dixon and utility back Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu – to feature on the bench.

“The likes of Edwill, Jordan, Ben-Jason, and Sacha have impressed us at training, and we believe they have what it takes to make their presence felt against a quality team such as Wales.”

World Cup-winning prop Vincent Koch will earn his 50th Test cap on the day, with most pundits praising Rassie’s good balance of youth and experience. Dr. Rassie also opted for a five-three forwards-backs split on the bench, including four World Cup winners – Bongi Mbonambi, Frans Malherbe, Grant Williams, and Damian de Allende.

“This is an exciting playing squad and travelling group, and we are looking forward to seeing how the uncapped players step up at top international level and how we execute what we’ve been working on at training in the last few days and at the alignment camps.”

A total of 10 players in the matchday squad featured in the 2023 World Cup final, while 16 players were members of the World Cup squad.

 

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Thirty players will travel to London on Wednesday, with the match against Wales kicking off on Saturday at 15:00 local time.

[source:news24&rugby365]