Lood De Jager, Handre Pollard and Cobus Reinach are amongst three changes to the squad to play England at Twickenham on Saturday 20 November 2021. The Montpellier duo were not selected last week in the Boks 30-15 victory over Scotland but will be gracing the field for South Africa this week while Reinach made an impact in the second half against Scotland.He will replace Herschell Jantjies. Aphelele Fassie, Sbu Nkosi and Elton Jantjies will be excluded from the squad while Jesse Kriel will remain at 14.

“We built up good momentum in the Tests against Wales and Scotland, and it is important for us to transfer that into our final match of the tour against England, so we opted to make only three changes to the starting team for this weekend’s clash,” Nienaber said.

“England will pose different threats to Scotland, and with that in mind we have decided to start with Handré, Cobus and Lood.”

“Elton, Herschel and Franco have shown that they can inject energy and ignite a spark on attack off the bench, which will be handy against an English outfit that we know will be highly charged up for this match.”

“England have made it clear that they’ll come hard at us in this match, and with a few British and Irish Lions players in their midst, home-ground advantage and a new record of eight wins in a row against Australia adding to their motivation this weekend, so we know it will be a hard grind,” Nienaber said.

“That said, we will enter the match equally motivated, especially with the opportunity to retain our status as the top team in the world for a third successive season, and winning all three matches in the Outgoing Tour for the first time in eight years being a real prospect.”

“This has been arguably the most challenging season for a Springbok team yet due to the challenges presented by the Covid-19 pandemic, and to finish off the year with a victory against England would be a fantastic reward for the team,” he added.

Squad Announcement – 15 Willie le Roux, 14 Jesse Kriel, 13 Lukhanyo Am, 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Makazole Mapimpi, 10 Handre Pollard, 9 Cobus Reinach, 8 Duane Vermeulen, 7 Kwagga Smith, 6 Siya Kolisi (c), 5 Lood de Jager, 4 Eben Etzebeth, 3 Trevor Nyakane, 2 Bongi Mbonambi, 1 Ox Nche.
Subs: 16 Malcolm Marx, 17 Steven Kitshoff, 18 Vincent Koch, 19 Franco Mostert, 20 Jasper Wiese, 21 Herschel Jantjies, 22 Elton Jantjies, 23 Frans Steyn.

Ireland’s Andrew Brace has been appointed as the match official and Assistant Referee duties would be handed to Angus Gardner (Australia) and Frank Murphy (Ireland), Brian MacNeice (Ireland) will be on TMO duty.

Kickoff: 17.15

Photo SA Rugby