The 10bet Lions take on Irish giants Leinster in Round 1 of the Vodacom United Rugby Championship at 10bet Ellis Park at 13:30 SAST, this weekend in what will be a repeat of their quarter-final meeting back in May in Dublin.
The SA Shield holders have, in the off-season, bolstered their stocks with the likes of Springbok Boan Venter, Boeta Chamberlain and Hyron Adams- all featuring in Ivan van Rooyen’s match 23 for Saturday.
Van Rooyen has also included young scrumhalf Zian Cilliers on the bench as well as schoolboy talent Ethan Adams- both in line to earn their senior international debuts come Saturday.
Looking ahead to Leinster, Ivan ‘Cash’ van Rooyen complimented the opposition’s ability to unsettle teams to suite their style of play.
“Leinster are quite good at getting the opposition to play out of their system- their superpower is to get you out of your structure, so it will be important for us to get back into momentum and re-apply the pressure.”
“Their defensive system is really good, so if you are 50/50 on attack they get the upper hand so there’s a big challenge for us ahead,” he cautioned.
The Lions boss welcomed the fact of playing Leo Cullen’s first up, saying they would have played them somewhere in the competition regardless.
“Well, you would have had to play them somewhere,” he quipped.
“Game one at home will be a challenge for us. I don’t think it’s too soon; obviously, there’s still a bit of scar tissue from the quarterfinal, but the best way to get back onto the horse is to jump back onto it. It’s going to be a tremendous challenge for us but one we are looking forward to,” he concluded.
10bet Lions 23: 15 Boeta Chamberlain, 14 Kelly Mpeku, 13 Henco van Wyk, 12 Richard Kriel, 11 Erich Cronje, 10 Chris Smith, 9 Nico Steyn, 8 Francke Horne (c), 7 Batho Hlekani, 6 Siba Mahashe, 5 Ruan Delport, 4 Etienne Oosthuizen, 3 Sebastian de Klerk, 2 PJ Botha, 1 Boan Venter. Replacements: 16 Morne Brandon, 17 SJ Kotze, 18 RF Schoeman, 19 Hyron Andrews, 20 Siba Qoma, 21 JC Pretorius, 22 Zian Cilliers, 23 Ethan Adams.