The Junior Springboks claimed a famous victory in the U20 Championship this past weekend, with several players impressing throughout the tournament in Italy.
Some of these stars have now been rewarded with a call up from Rassie Erasmus as the Springbok coach once again demonstrated some innovative thinking when naming his latest squad for the Rugby Championship.
Bathobele Hlekani, Cheswill Jooste and Haashim Pead have earned the opportunity to train with the Springbok group during their two-week conditioning camp in Johannesburg starting on Sunday 27 July, to orientate them into the Springbok culture.
Hlekani impressed with his powerful performances at blindside flank, Pead set the tournament alight as the standout scrumhalf in the U20 championship, while outside back Cheswill Jooste was a constant attacking threat.
Special opportunity with the Springboks
Speaking about the young guns invited to train with the squad for the next two weeks, Erasmus said: “We are tremendously proud of the Junior Springboks for winning the World Rugby U20 Championship and we were thrilled to see the talent coming through the junior ranks, so we opted to invite three of them to join us to expose them to our structures and the standards required at top international level.
“We believe this camp will benefit them significantly, and we are excited to see how they slot in and train with us.
“Unfortunately, we had to limit the size of the squad to ensure maximum outputs and more individual attention at our training sessions, so although more players could have been invited, we could only select three.”
What are your thoughts on these call-ups?
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