Boks arrive in Australia after travel delay

The Boks’ travelling squad of 34 gamers assembled in Johannesburg early on Thursday afternoon and had been set to fly to Adelaide through Sydney later that night, however their plans had been disrupted as a consequence of problems regarding the flight crew.

The Springboks had been in the end pressured to delay their departure to Australia for the away leg of the Championship to Friday at noon following the unexpected cancellation of their flight to Sydney.

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The Boks arrived in Sydney early on Saturday morning after which made the brief journey to Adelaide – with a heat welcome from SA supporters awaiting the squad on the airport – the place they are going to play their first of two Tests towards the Wallabies on the Adelaide Oval on Saturday, 27 August.

The crew wasted no time moving into the swing of issues with a health club session lined up for Saturday afternoon and one other Sunday, whereas they are going to resume full subject coaching classes on Monday.

South Africa face the Wallabies in their second Test in Sydney on Saturday, 3 September, earlier than taking up Argentina in two Tests, in Buenos Aires (17 September) and Durban (24 September) respectively.

“The players rested well on the plane, and everyone is excited to be in Australia are looking forward to our two Tests against the Wallabies,” stated Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber.

“I must commend our operational staff for the swift manner in which they dealt with the cancellation of our original flight and for making things as simple as possible for the team to hop onto the next available flight.

“The professional manner in which the situation was dealt with resulted in minimal disruption to our programme, which is certainly pleasing from a coaching perspective.”

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Nienaber added that the crew may have flush-out health club classes in the following two days to recuperate from the travel, and we are going to observe their ordinary Test week programme from tomorrow.

“This is going to be a massive week for us, and everyone understands the importance of ensuring that they recover as well as possible so that we can train full-out on Monday as we look to get our Rugby Championship campaign back on track.

“We haven’t beaten Australia at home since 2013, so we are under no illusions about the challenge that lies ahead. We will have to be at best to start our tour on a positive note.”