Key events
Pre game reading
Dave Rennie’s New Zealand project is off to a flyer, read about the latest installment here.
Get in touch, why don’t you? Share all your thoughts, gripes, questions etc on the email.
Teams
South Africa
Aphelele Fassi; Jaco Williams, Jesse Kriel, Damian de Allende, Kurt-Lee Arendse; Vusi Moyo, Cobus Reinach; Gerhard Steenekamp, Malcolm Marx, Carlu Sadie; Cobus Wiese, Ruben van Heerden; Paul de Villiers, Pieter-Steph du Toit, Jasper Wiese.
Replacements: Andre-Hugo Venter, Jan-Hendrik Wessels, Wilco Louw, Ben-Jason Dixon, Marco van Staden, Herschel Jantjies, Manie Libbok, Damian Willemse.
Wales
Blair Murray; Louis Rees-Zammit, Max Llewellyn, Ben Thomas, Josh Adams; Dan Edwards, Tomos Williams; Rhys Carre, Dewi Lake, Dillon Lewis; Teddy Williams, Adam Beard; Alex Mann, Jac Morgan, Aaron Wainwright.
Replacements: Ryan Elias, Nicky Smith, Ben Warren, Freddie Thomas, Tommy Reffell, James Botham, Reuben Morgan-Williams, Joe Hawkins.
Preamble
Sometimes, your job is difficult. Whether you’re a mechanic dealing with a tricky gasket, or the customer services desk staff in a supermarket faced with an angry person failing to understand you cannot return worn underwear, but especially if you are the coach of Wales men’s team within the hideous state of the superstructure all around you that apparently passes for the professional running of a major sport. Steve Tandy’s job is very difficult.
Added to this, the final fixture of a tricky summer is South Africa in Durban. Even a rotated Springbok team remains a keen foe, just ask Scotland, and this is what faces the swapped together and underpowered Cymru side today.
For the Boks, with the World Cup just over a year away and key players ageing, this will be another chance for Rassie Erasmus to cast an eye over some prospects for his next great transformation project. Vusi Moyo, the young and very green stand-off one of the more interesting selections.
It wasn’t too long ago that the men in red were securing their first ever Test win on these shores – 2022, Bloemfontain under Wayne Pivac. Today will not be the day they secure their second.
I know whose job I’d rather have.
