The Junior Springboks have included three uncapped players, namely hooker Luca Bakkes, flyhalf Liam Koen and outside back Likhona Finca, in their match day squad for their World Rugby Under-20 opening match against Fiji at the Cape Town Stadium on Saturday.
The World Rugby U20 Championship returns to South Africa in June and July when the 12 best Under-20 teams will battle it out for global supremacy.
The Junior Springboks will kick off the inaugural Rugby Championship (TRC) Under-20 tournament with an exciting match against New Zealand on Thursday, 2 May at the Sunshine Coast Stadium, SANZAAR confirmed on Wednesday when it announced the draw for new competition.
SA Rugby’s Director of Rugby Rassie Erasmus and Junior Springbok head coach Bafana Nhleko reacted enthusiastically to the announcement made by SANZAAR that a new U20 Rugby Championship will kick off in 2024.
SA U20 captain Paul de Villiers says there are no external pressures on them to reach the final when they meet Ireland in the World Rugby U20 Championship semi-finals at Athlone Stadium in Cape Town on Sunday.
The Junior Springboks will face Ireland with an unchanged match day squad in the first semi-final of the World Rugby U20 Championships at Athlone Stadium in Cape Town on Sunday afternoon.
The Junior Springboks plan to deliver an energetic effort at Paarl Gymnasium on Thursday, where they will take on Italy in their second Pool C match of the 2023 World Rugby Under-20 Championship.
Junior Springbok captain Paul de Villiers is amongst a group of seven players that will represent the South African Under-20 team for a second year running after being named in the starting team to face Georgia in their World Rugby U20 Championship opener in Stellenbosch on Saturday.
The Junior Springboks arrived in Italy on Tuesday evening and immediately went about their business to fine-tune their preparations for Friday’s opening match of the U20 Six Nations Summer Series against England in Verona.
Five Springboks have been nominated for the SA Rugby Player of the Year for 2021.