They have I think 13 days before their next match after Tonga. So no need to rest anybody. But I like the fact he did rest some players.
Rassie obviously thinks Fourie and Van Staden can do the hookers job. Good test to see.
Unless there are niggles or whatever I would have liked to see Snyman on the bench or even Kleyn.
Pollard had to start. Libbok is there in case of breakdown.
Willemse, Malherbe and Du Toit get well earned rests.
Interesting to see Williams on the wing. Brilliant speed. Looking forward to seeing him playing outside the creative Moodie. Mpimpi combines very well with Willie.
Boks must win and score 4 tries to earn the 5 points.
What is Rassie doing?
All other countries are starting their best teams in nearly all of the games so they can peak as the tournament goes on.
Also, the Boks have almost 2 weeks until a quarter-final game -so surely a first-choice team should be starting.
The Boks have fielded a B-team in nearly all of the games, and in many cases, it is not even clear who is a B-team or A-team.
This just proves how useless the squad is. Williams is playing wing yet again. Against some very big South Sea Islanders. Our small wingers have a real hard time against them normally.
Then, I completely forgot about the useless Orie. Another player we didn't need to select. I see no Willemse. Duanne is shifting to 7?
The more I like at these random selections and players playing out of position the more frustrated I get with this team.
Fourie, over the top flanker.
Orie, wow, what is he doing there
Vermeulen, average, not sure he has the stamina.
Wiese, dumb power
Will be his 3rd time that he plays at 13 in his entire professional career
Williams, wing again. He is quick but can he defend a big south sea islander
The we have Van Staden at Hooker. I would have started with him to really test him
A red card and this team could be a bit of a problem
Sad to see Esterhozen playing in the B team again…..this guy must be incredibly frustrated.
Esterhozen’s break against the All Blacks was the best bit of centre play we have seen from the Boks this season. Like the Aki break past Dud Allende it actually changed momentum in the game,
AE has had one bad game this season. The backline runs better with him in it.
Delande is good at what he does, but he is very individualistic.
klop
Well, also noted no Willemse on the bench. They must be resting him.
What I have see of Willie is that he is off the pace and lacks that extra speed. Yes, he lobs some scoring passes but he also gets caught.
We do miss an inform Am, not sure what the status on him is and probably too late to bring him in against France.
That said, I would not take my eye off this Tongan team. We got caught out against Japan.
Just Wish RasNiebar would create proper competition in the team.
Well, we are here because of their dumb planning and arrogance. We should have won that game against Ireland. We lost all our scrum dominance when Fourie came on. Not a scrumming hooker.
Also, when you throw a skew throw 1 out 4, it is still not good enough because it counts.
I have seen Vermuelwn play for 80 minutes. He is going pretty well.
I am going Fourie has a good game in the scrums and shows what he can do outside the scrums with his pace.
It would be a boost if Pollard played well and showed be can get the backs going.
I would like to see Reinach be more assertive.
We have picked a pretty mobile pack and some exciting backs.
Let's get those 5 points and leave Scotland and Ireland to sweat it out??
Watch out for Tongans, they are very tough men, a small country of only 250000 but includes such greats as Jonah Lomu...very proud, yet limited in manpower.
But a spanner in the works, SA players, they throw velocity at you physically to try curtail your ego...they know they cannot win but try to upset the program to favour the AB's.
Nice people, I like them, always wanted to visit Tonga, the "Friendly Islands".
Marx is not a core Bok. Given the span of time, his career has been quite unfortunate. He was the best hooker in the world in 2016, then played a solid 2017, and then never recovered throughout the Erasmus years. I would now say that his best years have been lost under this sham of a coach. As we have seen the last couple of years, he is not even a shadow of himself. Perhaps one of the first of many players to regress under Erasmus; Pollard being the other. Thor hasn't been good this year either. He was praised for things, but none of these things have been found in any video review.
South Africa went for a 7-1 split on the bench against Ireland but they have gone to a 5-3 for Sunday’s encounter, with Manie Libbok in reserve should Pollard go down with cramp.
“If you look at Handre, he hasn’t played top-level club rugby since the first weekend in May,” Nienaber told reporters: “It’s about 19 weeks ago and in that 19 weeks, he’s only played 30 minutes and that was in the Premiership Cup [for Leicester Tigers against Sale Sharks] a fortnight ago.
“There’s a good possibility that he probably would struggle to get through an intense game, a good probability that he might cramp up.
“That’s why we went with the 5-3 split and have Manie on the bench just for cover.”
“His club, Leicester Tigers, also made sure he was 100 per cent fit before playing him and then he only played one half,” the coach said.
“They ensured he recovered enough to take the full load of a week’s training and then play in a game.
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That does not explain why Jessica Kriel is on the bench...unless this is Kriel's retirement game...
This is the last test at the world cup for a few players:
Hendrikse will not make the bench again.
Grant Williams has falled out of favour - mostly due to wild passes.
Mapimpi is also playing his last test of the tournament
Orrie is on th next bus home after this test.
Lomp is useless….the man (along with Dud Allende) whose weak defense took us out of WC 2015.
If a player gets injured in the Tonga test, I wonder if the Boks would call up a hooker.
Dweeb(a) has not played very well at test rugby, but he has not had much time. His lineout throws were poor when he did play.
I wonder if the Boks would call up a hooker.
Dweeb(a) has not played very well at test rugby, but he has not had much time
Rassie might have pinged that Dweeba is no better than part time hookers Fourie and Van Staden
