Fourie back in the Bok fold
Rassie Erasmus needed a forward. He found a familiar one. Deon Fourie is back in the Springboks squad, added this week for the Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series against the All Blacks. The 39-year-old covers both hooker and the back row, and he earned the call the hard way. He played through the Stormers’ brave defeat to New Zealand in Friday’s tour opener in Cape Town, then got the nod to join the national camp in Johannesburg on Tuesday.
His caps tell a modest story. Thirteen Tests since his debut in 2022. His last appearance in the green and gold came in the biggest match of all, the 2023 World Cup final win over the All Blacks in Paris. Three years on, at an age when most players have long since walked away, he is being asked to help hold a squad together.
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Kolisi injury forces Erasmus’s hand
The timing is no accident. Siya Kolisi limped out of Saturday’s 17-10 win over Argentina in Buenos Aires with a hamstring problem, the second one this year. The captain had already sat out the entire Nations Championship in July. Now he faces another scan and another wait.
“I hurt my hamstring again, unfortunately. So I’ll go for a scan and see how far it is,” Kolisi told ESPN Scrum after the match. Erasmus tried to calm the nerves around it. “He injured his hamstring, the other hamstring. But it doesn’t look too bad.”
Fourie is not the only one heading back. The 26 players who travelled to South America return to camp this week, and Cheslin Kolbe, Damian Willemse, Jesse Kriel and Ruan Nortje rejoin the group too.
What is at stake
The prize is a four-Test series against New Zealand, opening at Ellis Park on Saturday, August 22. Four meetings with the oldest rival, a captain in doubt, and a 39-year-old utility forward suddenly close to the heart of the plan. Erasmus built his name on squads that bend without snapping. He is about to test that idea once more.
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