O’Connor added by Pivac for trip to SA

UNCAPPED Scarlets prop Harri O’Connor has been called up to the Wales squad for next month’s South

Africa tour.

It means that Wales head coach Wayne Pivac will now take 34 players to South Africa, adding 21-year-old O’Connor to his original squad selection.

O’Connor (above) was born in North Yorkshire, but he qualifies for Wales through his father, who is from Bonymaen.

Saracens prop Sam Wainwright, who is also uncapped, was named earlier this month as squad replacement for an injured Leon Brown.

Wales face three Tests against the world champion Springboks, starting in Pretoria on July 2.

On calling up 21-year-old O’Connor, Pivac said: “(Prop) Tomas Francis has just picked up a niggle in his back, so it has been a bit of a problem for him on and off in the season.

“We are just treating that with care – we expect him to be fully fit for the first Test – so it is just a precautionary measure, really, to make sure we have the numbers in training and we can prepare as we need to.”

O’Connor’s selection takes the number of uncapped players to four, with him joining fellow prop Sam Wainwright, Leicester flanker Tommy Reffell and Cardiff number eight James Ratti.

“There is no better learning than going up against the best in the world in any sport, and at the moment, you would have to say the South African scrum has probably shown it has consistently been the best in the world,” Pivac said.

“Their lineout drive is superb, their forward play is probably second to none.

“They are not world champions for nothing.

“They are very, very good at what they do, so if you are a young guy going on tour and coming up against that, you are going to learn a lot.

“You are going to learn how much work you have got to do to get to that level, or hopefully you are going to go very well and start off what could be a very long career for yourself.”