Lassie Erasmus is adamant that the 23-man Springbok squad selected for the historic test match against Portugal in Bloemfontein is not a “B team”.
Erasmus fielded a drastically changed line-up with Salman Moerat as captain for the first time and fielded seven debutants for Saturday’s Test match.
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The four players who played against Ireland in the second Test in Durban have been retained: Kurt-Lee Arendse, RG Snyman, Moerat and Sasha Feinberg-MgomeZulu.
But when asked whether it was accurate to call them the B team after revealing their team name, Erasmus laughed off the suggestion.
Erasmus said, “No, not the B team.”
“If we had played Ireland last week, we would have thought it would be a tough Test match. And that’s what we want.
“You need to have two experienced players in each position and one young player who is willing to take his chance.
“We know we’re going to have a tough downturn like we had last Saturday. I hope these guys are proud.”
Despite a number of changes, the team still has a wealth of experienced players, with World Cup winners Lucanjo Arm, Andre Esterhuizen, Mani Riebock and Kobus Reinach all playing in their first Test matches of the year.
Erasmus elaborated: “If you compare (Apellele) Pasi with Sasha (Feinberg-Mango-Mangomezulu), if you compare Lucanyo with Jesse (Kriel), and André with Damian (de Allende), and Mani with Sasha or Damian Willemse.”
“Mani and Kobus played in the World Cup semi-finals and they were paired up there.
“Ben-Jason Dixon is not that different from Peter Steph (Du Toit) in the way he plays.
“RG (Snaiman) and Salman (Moerat) were in the team that played last week.
“Thomas du Toit went to the World Cup and everyone knows how good he was at Bath.
“Eben Etzebes has 120 caps, somewhere in there is Namibia, somewhere in there is Romania. So a Test cap is a Test cap.
“Portugal beat Fiji and Ireland also won their Chukas warm-up game.
“I expect them, and they expect themselves, to represent the Springboks as the number one team in the world.”
Photo: Charles Lombard/Gallo Images
The post ‘Lassie: This is not Balk ‘B Team” was first published in SA Rugby Magazine.