Erasmus brings in de Bruin for June campaign

LIONS head coach Swys de Bruin will join the Springbok coaching staff on a consultancy basis for the June Tests against Wales and England.

The addition of De Bruin is part of the process to involve coaches from all local franchises with the preparation of the Springboks, an initiative by new SA rugby director Rassie Erasmus.

De Bruin will link up with the Springboks in the build-up to their first Test of the year, against Wales in Washington DC on June 2, followed by the three-Test series against England which kicks off on June 9 in Johannesburg.

“I’ve always said that we must improve our communication and cooperation with the local franchise coaches,” said Erasmus.

“They spend much more time with the players, so better cooperation with them can only be a benefit and should be an obvious thing.

“Swys and some of his colleagues from the Lions joined us at the second alignment camp, as did members of the Stormers coaching team, while a couple of Bulls coaches were there for the first camp.

“It was really great to have them with us for those sessions and they played an active part in the various technical sessions.”

Meanwhile former Springbok fly-half Johan Goosen came out of retirement on Friday to play for the Cheetahs against Munster in Bloemfontein.

Goosen, 25, left Racing 92 in December 2016 and announced he would be taking up a position as commercial director at a horse stud farm in Bloemfontein, infuriating the French club.

The 13-cap back has been training with the Cheetahs to keep fit ahead of a move back to France with Montpellier in July, and could fill a number of backline positions in the national side.

Montpellier paid Racing a fee of £1.5m (R20 million) to buy out his contract, which had been set to run to 2020. Goosen, who first moved to France in 2014, started at full-back in his last Test against Wales in November 2016.