1
Saracens in talks with retired Springbok van der Merwe - report
By Online Editors
Former Springboks second row Flip van der Merwe could be coming out of retirement to play next season in the Championship with Saracens after the club recently lost second rows George Kruis to the Japanese Top League and Nick Isiekwe to Northampton on a year-long loan.
According to The Rugby Paper, the 37-cap Springbok has been spoken to by Mark McCall’s automatically relegated club with a view to see might he be interested in playing second-tier rugby at the age of 35.
Ahead of his June 6 birthday, it has emerged that van der Merwe is a player that Saracens would like to see playing at Allianz Park as they plot their way back into the Premiership following the messy salary cap saga that led to their demotion.
According to the report: “Saracens have spoken to van der Merwe to gauge if he has any interest in spending a season in the Championship.”
Having forged his career at the Bulls in South Africa, van der Merwe came to Europe to join Clermont where he flourished before infrequent selection during 2018/19 convinced him it was time to hang up the boots.
He quit and enrolled at Cambridge University where he is on a two-year course similar to Australian James Horwill, the ex-Harlequins lock. They both played in last December’s Varsity match at Twickenham.
When he announced his retirement last year, van der Merwe, who tips the scales at 118kgs, said: “The body helps you to say stop.
“You have to be honest, I cannot go on. When I see guys being sheepish… I can’t catch them anymore. It’s a hard decision to make in the sense that it’s something, there is emotion.”
Following The Rugby Paper report, van der Merwe tweeted a reponse to RugbyPass suggesting there was no plan to come out of retirement.
Trending on RugbyPass
2
All Blacks XV player ratings vs Munster
3
Suaalii strikes awe as Wallabies lose midfielder
4
Scott Robertson responds about handling errors
5
Latest Comments
Nah, that just needs some more variation. Chip kicks, grubber stabs, all those. Will Jordan showed a pretty good reason why the rush was bad for his link up with BB.
If you have an overlap on a rush defense, they naturally cover out and out and leave a huge gap near the ruck.
It also helps if both teams play the same rules. ARs set the offside line 1m past where the last mans feet were😅
Go to commentsYeah nar, should work for sure. I was just asking why would you do it that way?
It could be achieved by outsourcing all your IP and players to New Zealand, Japan, and America, with a big Super competition between those countries raking it in with all of Australia's best talent to help them at a club level. When there is enough of a following and players coming through internally, and from other international countries (starting out like Australia/without a pro scene), for these high profile clubs to compete without a heavy australian base, then RA could use all the money they'd saved over the decades to turn things around at home and fund 4 super sides of their own that would be good enough to compete.
That sounds like a great model to reset the game in Aus. Take a couple of decades to invest in youth and community networks before trying to become professional again. I just suggest most aussies would be a bit more optimistic they can make it work without the two decades without any pro club rugby bit.
Go to comments