Springboks Anthem

The Springboks line up for the national anthem. Photo: Samuel Shivambu/BackpagePix

REMINDER: When the Boks are next in action!

The Boks will soon be back in action, with a clash against Ireland set to kick off a blockbuster end-of-year tour.

Springboks Anthem

The Springboks line up for the national anthem. Photo: Samuel Shivambu/BackpagePix

The Boks are currently on a short break, with most players already playing for their respective clubs and franchises. They are set to assemble for the year-end tour at the end of October, with an extended squad soon set to be revealed.

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The Boks will face Ireland on Saturday 5 November (19:30 SA time), France on 12 November (22:00), Italy on 19 November (15:00) and England on 26 November (19:30) on the tour, while there are also two mid-week fixtures.

The SA ‘A’ team will face Munster on Thursday, 10 November, and the Bristol Bears a week later on 17 November.

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Although the final match of the Boks’ end-of-year tour falls outside of World Rugby’s Test window, there has been some good news for South Africa.

According to Rapport newspaper, the Springboks could have their Japan-based players at Twickenham. This includes Willie le Roux (Toyota Verblitz), Jesse Kriel (Canon Eagles), Damian de Allende (Wild Knights), Pieter-Steph du Toit (Toyota Verblitz), Lood de Jager (Wild Knights), Malcolm Marx ( Kubota Spears), Franco Mostert (Honda Heat), Kwagga Smith (Shizuoka Blue Revs) and Faf de Klerk (Yokohama Canon Eagles).

malcolm marx springboks

The Boks’ preparations for the 2023 World Cup are well under way

Meanwhile, the Boks recently confirmed that they will face Wales just a few weeks before opening their World Cup campaign against Scotland in Marseille on Sunday, 10 September.

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Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber’s men will then cross paths with Romania (17 September in Bordeaux), Ireland (23 September in Paris) and Tonga (1 October in Marseille) in their other Rugby World Cup Pool B encounters in France.

With Wales being one of their regular Northern Hemisphere challengers and currently ranked seventh in the world, they will offer the Nienaber’s charges a good test to measure themselves going into the global spectacle.

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The Boks beat Wales by 2-1 in the Incoming Series on local soil earlier this year, but apart from a 23-18 victory in their opening match of the 2021 Outgoing Tour in Cardiff and a tightly-fought Rugby World Cup quarter-final win by 19-16 in Yokohama in 2019, South Africa suffered four straight defeats against the Welsh between 2016 and 2018 (three times in Cardiff and once in Washington DC).

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Bok coach and captain