Overview
- Rassie Erasmus confirmed a much-changed 23 with a seven-forwards, one-back bench featuring Bongi Mbonambi and Eben Etzebeth, with Cobus Reinach poised to reach 50 caps off the bench.
- Damian Willemse starts at fullback with Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu at fly-half, Morne van den Berg at scrum-half, Siya Kolisi captaining, Franco Mostert on the flank, and Johan Grobbelaar at hooker.
- Up to 12 Springbok regulars have returned to clubs because the match falls outside World Rugby’s window, including Malcolm Marx, Lood de Jager, Handré Pollard and Cheslin Kolbe.
- Wales are also without a raft of English- and French-based players and have named a largely regional squad drawn from Cardiff, Dragons, Ospreys and Scarlets.
- Erasmus highlighted depth after using 49 players this year and indicated Duane Vermeulen is on standby as emergency cover, while South Africa’s bench alone carries 374 caps compared with 267 for Wales’ entire squad.