A highly-rated Junior Springbok’s dreams of being part of the Bok setup for the back-end of their European tour were dashed due to injury.
Siphosethu Mnebelele was set to become the latest SA U20 player fast-tracked into the Springbok setup, until a cruel knee injury scuppered his plans last week.
According to Rapport, the 19-year-old hooker had been invited to join Rassie Erasmus’ touring squad in Dublin, but picked up an injury during the SA U19 Academy team’s final tour match in Cork.
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Junior Boks coach Kevin Foote wasn’t surprised by the Springbok interest in his star rake.
“Esethu is an excellent athlete with brilliant fundamental skills,” Foote told Rapport. “He works extremely hard with his lineout throwing and scrummaging. He has a completion rate of more than 96% with his throws.”
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Erasmus has shown a willingness to blood Junior Boks talent, having involved three of Mnebelele’s teammates – Batho Hlekani, Cheswill Jooste and Haashim Pead – in training sessions in June.
The Bok coach wanted to pit them against the senior squad’s heavyweight forwards to gauge the gap between age-grade and Test-level rugby.
Photo: Richard Huggard/Gallo Images
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