The Springboks may have an alternative captain leading them onto the field for their second tour match against Scotland at Murrayfield in Edinburgh on Saturday.
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Coach Heyneke Meyer has said that while he intends keeping changes to a minimum out of respect for Scotland and the need to build winning momentum, he is considering giving his regular captain, Jean de Villiers, a rest.
Meyer was responding to a press conference at the team hotel in Edinburgh on where Western Province’s inform centre Juan de Jongh stood in his plans. The omission of De Jongh, the star of his team’s recent win over the Sharks in the Currie Cup final in Durban, was one of the talking points before the match against Dublin in Ireland last week.
“I definitely want to give Juan a chance, the reason I left him out last week was just because I wanted to keep changes to a minimum from the perspective of what we needed on defence,” said Meyer.
“I haven’t made up my mind completely about this yet, and I still need to talk to a few people, but I would like to institute a rotation policy in the midfield. I thought Jaco Taute played his best test so far against Ireland, so it is a case of whether we play Jaco and Juan together in the midfield, or whether we pair up Juan with Jean.”
Asked if that meant he was thinking of leaving out his captain, Meyer said that there was a chance De Villiers would not be leading the side at Murrayfield.
“I am thinking of giving Jean a rest this week as he has been struggling a bit with that hamstring injury that has been bothering him recently,” he said.
“I still believe fullback is Jaco Taute’s best position, and would love to play him there now, but I don’t want to make too many changes for the Scotland game. I think we should be looking to build momentum, and we did not play well last time out against Ireland. I have a lot of respect for Scotland.
“They may have lost heavily to the All Blacks but it was mainly in a period of 10 minutes that the All Blacks did most of the damage. Scotland scored three tries, which is not something we or Australia have managed against New Zealand this year.”
The Bok team will only be finalised later and named on Wednesday, but Meyer confirmed that Pat Lambie would continue at flyhalf.
“He didn’t have much opportunity to stamp his authority on the game in the first half but he showed some nice touches in the second and Pat also knows he is capable of better so I would like to back him and give him a chance to gain confidence going forward by building on his performance,” said Meyer.
Should De Villiers sit out the Murrayfield test, vice-captain Adriaan Strauss, who has rapidly stamped himself as an international player of quality in the absence of the injured Bismarck du Plessis, should be the man to lead the Boks.
29 @ Puma:
meant = deserves
I’d like to see Pat and Heinke get a start as a front row, I have a feeling they will do a good job.
Juan deserves his start, I’d also start Coetzee and give Willem a rest, maybe bring him on as a sub, or even rest him totally and give Arno Botha a chance.
The rest I would keep the same.
Puma wrote:
Stormersboy wrote:
? who deserve and who decide?
@ superBul:
Explain?
@ Stormersboy:
OK take it from this view.
PDP feel they deserve
Players get a MOM, do they deserve?
I say we all cry MERIT, when do you qualify on Merit? After 1 great game/season?
You tell me now.
@ superBul:
Juan is probably the best 13 playing in SA at the moment. He deserves his chance by virtue of being better than Taute at 13 by a long way, so hence my statement.
36 @ Stormersboy:
Some good No 13’s IN South Africa or on the radar for the future… but I think you are right, Juan de Jong is the best No 13 at the moment.
There’s also Lionel Mapoe, Paul Jordaan and some youngsters baying to come through to the big stage in the next year or 2.
Personally I don’t think JJ Engelbrecht is in that bracket, neither Johan Sadie or Robert Ebersohn.
To me Jaco Taute must specialize at Fullback, stay there, only get selected at Fullback… and not at No 13.
@ grootblousmile:
There is a concern about Jordaan’s hands apparently, but he ticks all the other boxes. Lightning quick too.
Agreed on Taute at 15.
@ Stormersboy:
36
i agree that JdeJ is not one of those i talked about, he is for years now reliable and has proven himself in every competition, constantly.
38 @ Stormersboy:
I’ll specifically have a critical look at Paul Jordaan’s hands in Super Rugby, now that you have pointed it out… I think he is very gifted and a youngster who could develop nicely
@ grootblousmile:
Me too. The hands comment comes from some of the provincial players that I know.
I hadn’t noticed it before.
40 @ grootblousmile:
Agree gbs, Jordaan is a real classy player and will be hunting that 13 jersey down next year and so will Mapoe. The reason I think it is fair to start Juan at outside centre this tour, he is on tour and should be given a chance now before the others come chasing this position down for themself. He deserved to start against Ireland already so Meyer can see him play and judge for himself. We all know already Juan is a classy player. My only small problem with Juan is he hugs the ball sometimes for himself. Though with Meyer’s game plan it seems he wants his centres to do just that, just to hold onto it, bash it up and go to ground. A waste really, but that is the game plan and players will play to it otherwise get dropped it seems. Do hope Juan does his own thing this weekend as he is a wonderful player. Again if he does not impress Meyer, which will be hard to believe, then there are those other two players in Mapoe and Jordaan that will be chasing for this position at the Boks next year. That is if Meyer even looks at Jordaan as he is not a big fella, but he is top class and his defence is brilliant and has tremendous speed.
41 @ Stormersboy:
What about Jordaan’s hands?
Its Dewali here and jeez the fireworks are going off per minute!!
I’m watching the replay NZ/Scotland with one eye over my dinner here…….
We are in big shyte against the Scots on Saturday, if we play the same as before.
Bok rugby is becoming extremely boring and stressful for me at the moment; one dimentional, predictable, dumb, dull, rigid, stale, conservative, stagnant, individualistic, opportunistic….you name it.
Maybe I’m just getting too old for this, or maybe I’m just beginning to lose interest in it all.
But I will be on my post in front of the tv come Saturday, as usual….hoping for some sparkle from the boys.
I have me doubts, though…..
45 @ Pietman:
Hey Pietman that sounds like you are paying Scotland a compliment there, if you get a chance to ‘rewind’ the game please go and have a look at the build up to All Blacks first try (think it was the first one) you will see ABs did a short throw in at the lineout but I thought at the time seeing it live that it was a skew throw will be nice to hear from you if you think it was skew or not because play flowed on from there as it wasn’t called as skew and soon ABs scored at that point Scotland was 7-3 in the lead (if it was the 1st try) but also it was after that lineout and in the process of making ground to score the try that Ross Rennie picked up his shoulder injury. If it wasn’t skew then fairplay accidents happen but conceding the try and losing Rennie at that point was a big blow for us as he was the only out and out fetcher playing that day for Scotland and we all know how tough its playing against Mc Caw even with a good fetcher in your team let alone without one.
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