South Africa, Italy, Samoa and Scotland will all be in action tomorrow at Kings Park for the first two matches of a four-team tournament. In Round 1, Scotland will face Samoa followed by South Africa and Italy.
Round 2 will see South Africa play Scotland and Italy facing Samoa in Nelspruit, the following week the two bottom sides will play in a third-fourth place playoff and the two top teams will play in the final which will take place at Loftus, both matches will again take place on the same day.
The Springboks have played the Azzurri 10 times, all won by the Springboks. Four of those tests were played in Italy and six in South Africa. Italy have only managed to score 129 points in the 10 tests with the Springboks scoring 533. The last time these two met was 2010 in East London when the Springboks won 55 – 11.
Italy have made 7 changes to their team that beat Ireland 22 – 15 during last years Six Nations championship. Fly-half Luciano Orquera and lock Joshua Furno moved to the bench, while centres Gonzalo Canale and Gonzalo Garcia were left out of the match day 23. Flank Simone Favaro and South African born lock Quinton Geldenhuys will miss the tour due to injury while prop Andrea Lo Cicero has retired.
Alberto Di Bernardo taking over from Orquara will play his first test for the Azzurri at the age of 32 while Luca Morisi and Alberto Sgarbi will form the new centre pairing on his outside, while Alberto De Marchi replaces retired Cicero at prop. Antonio Pavanello and Marco Bortolami will form the new lock pairing and Robert Barbieri will take over from Furno on the flank.
Italy
Andrea Masi; Giovanbattista Venditti, Luca Morisi, Alberto Sgarbi, Luke McLean; Alberto Di Bernardo, Edoardo Gori; Sergio Parisse (capt), Robert Barbieri, Alessandro Zanni; Marco Bortolami, Antonio Pavanello; Lorenzo Cittadini, Leonardo Ghiraldini, Alberto De Marchi
Replacements:Davide Giazzon, Matias Aguero, Martin Castrogiovanni, Valerio Bernabo, Joshua Furno, Tobias Botes, Luciano Orquera, Tommaso Iannone
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Don’t know a lot of these guys but I have a feeling Bokke going to spank them on Saturday.
You missed another South African – Tobias Botes.
Many felt he should have started this match.
Yeah Botes born in Worcester, played for Griquas and 3 SR games for Cheetas before he left
@pierre_mackie (Comment 3) :
And already has a fair amount of caps for them, 13 if I am not mistaken!
@Richard Ferguson (Comment 4) : yes 13
@pierre_mackie (Comment 5) : Tobie was in Boland landbou, boland griekwas played scrumhalf made flyhalf switch at Griekwas Coached him at School.
Richard I just saw a sorry clip on Youtube about the 2015 Springbok Backline: I have a passion for seeing young talent make it, and try and influence and open some doors with my limited resources as far as I can. but I am wondering I heard a story that Tim Swiel who I rate a lot made himself unavailable for selection(under 20 World Cup). And with a sms or 2 heard his a bit of a Air head at the moment. This is very sad, he really has all the goods going for him. But his also in a era of exceptional young talent. really brilliant boys at this stage:
So here is my big Q, AFTER A LONG STORY:
WHO DO YOU THINK BASED ON talent WILL make it to the Bok Time, and what players are U worried about, due to injury, attitude ext…
I for example rate Ulrich Beyers as one of the best talents in South Africa but the boy loves to party, lack of fitness and its sad to hear that he might not make it due to this(or still making it in spit of this), he has more rugby in his little finger than Jurgen Visser and JJ Engelbrecht combined but Engelbrecht is one of the hardest working boys in the game, so he is pulling it off and all credit to him.
Who is your boys that we can look out for? and are they in good hands? I see SARU contracted ON SOME PLAYERS profiles but those players almost all have the ‘same profile’ if you catch my drift.
@BoerSeun (Comment 6) :
Any player in the Sharks setup is in trouble! 👿
No, but seriously, of the current crop at the Sharks, I really like Rob du Preez and Khaya Majola.
Du Preez might get stuck a bit behind Lambie, but Majola could coma at exactly the right time, if we are going to replace Botes (who must be looking to retire in the next two or so years)
Both the scrummies we have also look good, I am specifically excited about Stefan Ungerer coming through.
I do not know these boys at all, and have little info about their attitude and work rate, so I can hardly comment on that.
There are a few others worth mentioning in the Sharks setup, but we desperately need someone at that level to identify the talent and nurture them into stars. No use we have this awesome talent but nobody is talking to him about the plans to use him in the future.
@Richard Ferguson (Comment 7) : Yes, Cobus starting, Ungerer on the bench. No more Charl 😉
@SeanyJMc (Comment 8) :
Would like to see that happening in the Currie Cup, but I fear we won’t see that until 2015..
Interesting to note with the June Internationals, being a prep for 4nations to come is the competitiveness. NZ face up against France, while Aus host the Lions, all top tier sides. The Boks preparation does not say for much with SAMOA, Scotland and Italy visiting. The other two sides clearly will be better prepared.