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What the Boks expect from Eddie Jones' fired up Wallabies
By AAP
South Africa are fully focused on winning this year's Rugby Championship ahead of their World Cup defence in France, Springbok centre Andre Esterhuizen said as they prepare to face Australia in their tournament opener in Pretoria.
The Boks are to employ a split squad tactic this year and will send a number of first-team players to New Zealand this week to acclimatise ahead of their second Rugby Championship fixture against the All Blacks in Auckland on July 15.
It was a tactic they employed successfully in 2019 when they won both the Rugby Championship and World Cup in Japan.
It means they will field players from their wider squad for the Australia game on Saturday, but Esterhuizen says this should in no way be construed as the Boks taking the game, or the competition, lightly.
"This series (Rugby Championship) is a stepping stone for us to start moving in the right direction. We have to get things right now before the end goal (the World Cup)," he told rep orters on Monday.
"It has been a good three weeks (of training) together and we are all on the same page. We know what the goal is for the next four weeks. Everyone is happy and knows where they stand."
Australia will play their first game under returning coach Eddie Jones having not won in six previous meetings with the Boks at Loftus Versfeld.
"I think the Aussies always come to South Africa trying to make a statement," Esterhuizen said. "So we can expect a hard and good match, especially with Eddie taking the reins again."
"They will have a few things up their sleeves, and they are going to come with a lot of motivation because he (Jones) knows how to get a team fired up for a game."
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Latest Comments
Williams, Faletau, Lake, Morgan are the only ones who have a chance. None of them are guaranteed but I'd imagine they'll pick Williams and Morgan who could get in on merit and will likely be favoured for inclusivity.
Williams is fighting it out with Ben White for 3rd slot behind JGP and Mitchell.
Morgan is up against JVDF, Earl, Curry, Curry, Willis for 4 flanker slots, he's definitely good enough but huge call to leave any of those boys at home.
Lake and Faletau are good enough but I'd be surprised if Faletau gets picked over Conan and Lake would be up against Cowan-Dickie which I can't see happening. Blair Murray is probably 4th in the 15 pecking order behind Kinghorn, Heenan, Marcus Smith. He's probably a better 15 than Smith but Smith brings versatility so would be favoured. Since Smith may go on tour as a 10/15 hybrid, they would already have 3 fullbacks in the squad so Murray won't make it, good player though.
Nicky Smith and Dafydd Jenkins clutching at straws.
Go to commentsYep, if he really is the guy, they should have been able to know that then and stick with him despite the calamity. I think everyone knows about the other teams success that did that after having near equally as bad an exit.
If I had to put money on either side, it wouldn’t be for the RFU record making a decision like that. Tough one though.
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