Stormers remove two World Cup-winning Boks from Champions Cup squad
The Stormers have removed the injured duo of Steven Kitshoff and Damian Willemse from their Investec Champions Cup squad just days before their campaign gets underway.
The double World Cup-winning loosehead prop recently underwent neck fusion surgery, while Willemse is suffering from a groin injury in a year where he has been beset by issues.
Kitshoff was recently a guest on RugbyPass TV's Boks Office, where he detailed the severity of his injury and the surgery, saying: “It’s a bit of a stressful one because it’s such a high area of my neck – C1 and C2 – which is a bit of an issue."
The 32-year-old recently revealed on social media that he was "thrilled to share that my operation was a big success,” but added that it will be a "long recovery journey," which explains why he will be unavailable this weekend and beyond for the Stormers.
The pair have been deregistered for the opening round of the competition, against Toulon on Saturday at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, with two additional players being added.
Zachary Porthen has been called up in Kitshoff's place, while Willemse has been replaced by Jonathan Roche.
Saracens have been forced into the same move ahead of their match against the Bulls, with second-row academy graduate Charlie Barker being replaced by Tiff Eden.
Only one other Champions Cup outfit has opted to alter their squad, with Leicester Tigers deregistering back-row Joshua Manz in order for Cameron Miell to join the squad for their trip to face Bordeaux-Begles.
Edinburgh have been forced into two squad changes ahead of their Challenge Cup meeting with Gloucester, with Scotland centre Mark Bennett and flanker Connor Boyle out. Euan McVie and Tom Currie will step in in their place.
The final squad change comes from France, where Perpignan have called up back-row Andro Dvali for Alan Brazo.
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Read a lot of comments from locals who think he's out of his depth, but who knows, they seem to think they do lol
I did laugh out how he gave his team the upper end number, helps ram your points home :D Even funnier that he has no idea where the other 1.6million are from, South Africa? Japan? Australia? the rest of NZ? Ireland, or the UK, or France?
By the time you add up all the locations where they have a 20% fan segment the Crusaders will have 3.6million fans!
Yeah for sure, Super was on their screens for a good 20 years right, teams like the Chiefs seemed much more supported in Japan for sure.
But yeah, no real issue with what he was suggesting, just the way he was saying it. It's pretty typical from him I reckon, not surprised if he didn't mention how important their domestic fans were at all.
Go to commentsHe's not rubbish because he's Tah, he just wasn't very good and McReight is now showing what we were missing. A real 7.
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