TEST MATCHES ARE A GO
BOKS: ENTIRE SQUAD OPT TO SELF-ISOLATE BUT NO TALK OF MOVING MATCHES
Medical Advisory Group has found there was no slip-up in the Springboks’ Covid-19 protocols.
The British and Irish Lions are in South Africa and already preparing for Saturday’s tour opener against the Joburg Lions at Ellis Park. Warren Gatland’s side touched down at OR Tambo at around 9.30am yesterday, just hours after South Africa’s president announced the country would move to alert level 4 of the national lockdown amid a surge in coronavirus cases.
The announcement on Sunday night came only hours after it was announced that three positive Covid cases had been returned in the Springbok squad – namely by Herschel Jantjies, Vincent Koch and Sbu Nkosi.
The entire Bok squad opted to self-isolate, causing some concern about the two Tests against Georgia this Friday and next week, and the eight-match tour of the Lions.
The good news is Jantjies was cleared of Covid yesterday, the Lions are in the country, and the first Test against Georgia – the world champions’ first since they won the World Cup in Japan in 2019 – is on.
This, after the Lions Series Medical Advisory Group found that there was no slip-up in the Springboks’ Covid protocols and the squad was given the green light to resume training yesterday afternoon.
“In light of the strict precautionary measures taken by the team and the effective isolation protocols since the squad assembled, the Springboks can resume their training programme from Monday afternoon”, SA Rugby said in a statement issued yesterday.
The Lions Series Medical Advisory Group is made up of medical experts from both South Africa and the four Home Nations, and both CEOs, SA Rugby’s Jurie Roux and Lions managing director Ben Calveley, sit on the panel.
Jantjies, who had already been through a bout of Covid, was confirmed as being a false positive and has returned to training.
He is therefore likely to feature in the 23-man squad for the first Test against Georgia on Friday, but wing Nkosi and prop Koch will miss out, although they are asymptomatic.
Cape Town media have not passed up the opportunity to speculate that the entire Lions tour could be moved from Covid-ravaged Gauteng, but Bulls CEO Edgar Rathbone, whose Loftus Versfeld stadium is set to host the first Test against Georgia and then the Bulls’ match against the Lions on 10 July, dismissed the reports.
“We still have all the branding up in the stadium, we’re going ahead with preparations for Friday’s Test and next week’s game,” Rathbone told The Citizen.
The Springboks will announce the team to play Georgia today.