Lions Pride

After Saturday’s poor display and with the possibility of Etzebeth (banned), Bekker (injured) and Jannie du Plessis (injured) being unavailable for selection some changes up front are necessary especially in the light of the Boks’ struggle to retain possession.

Edit: Etzebeth banned for two weeks, Bakkies will probably be called up. Jannie and Cilliers uncertain, decision tomorrow whether to call upp tighthead replacement.

Heyneke Meyer may need to call in some help if the injuries rule out Bekker and du Plessis. Juandre and Flip (not ideal but they’re there) will replace Bekker and Eztebeth in the starting 15 while Pat will replace Jannie but that will leave us vulnerable on the bench with no lock cover (Willem Alberts isn’t a lock!) and only a loosehead (Dean Greyling) as prop cover.

Additional players can only be called up as injury replacements so call ups should out go to Franco van der Merwe or Anton Bresler as well as CJ van der Linde if Jannie and Andries are unavailable (as far as I know we cannot replace Etzebeth if he is banned).

The Boks:

15 Frans Steyn
14 Francois Hougaard (better on defence than Mvovo)
13 Juan de Jongh
12 Jean de Villiers
11 Bryan Habana
10 Pat Lambie (I know HM doesn’t see him as a flyhalf but he has experience)
9 Ruan Pienaar
8 Duane Vermeulen
7 Marcel Coetzee
6 Francois Louw
5 Juandre Kruger
4 Flip van der Merwe (not my first choice, or second, but he is there)
3 Pat Cilliers
2 Adriaan Strauss
1 Beast Mtawarira
16 Craig Burden
17 CJ van der Linde
18 Bakkies Botha
19 Willem Alberts
20 Johan Goosen
21 Zane Kirchner (not to be used except in an emergency but at a push he can cover fullback, wing and centre)
22 Lwazi Mvovo

Unfortunately this team is weak up front and will still struggle to get and to retain possession and I don’t see them beating the All Blacks but that’s what he have available over there.

As I said in my Springbok Stocktake post, we just don’t have the personnel or the world class players to be really confident about competing with the best.