Province skipper could be out for season

17 August 2015 - 02:01 By Craig Ray

Western Province could face the rest of the Currie Cup campaign without skipper Juan de Jongh, who sustained a knee injury in the scrappy 9-3 victory over the Free State Cheetahs on Saturday. De Jongh was helped off the field early in the second half, and coach John Dobson did not appear confident that the news would be good after a scan today."Johnny Kotze is fit and he will come into frame for selection at centre," he saidOn the subject of the team's performance at Newlands in wet, cold and windy conditions, Dobson said: "Our lineouts were good in the sense that we only lost one ball in very difficult conditions."But our mauling and our stopping of their mauls were terrible."If you go to Loftus next week and perform like that in that area of the game, we're in for a tough time."We knew before kick-off that we weren't going to score four tries in those conditions, but not to score one was disappointing."But we have two wins and guys like Nemo [Nizaam Carr] have won many times at Loftus now, so we go there with some confidence."Flank Deon Stegmann fractured a cheekbone in the Blue Bulls' victory over Griquas on Friday night, and has been ruled out of Saturday's clash with Western Province. Centre William Small-Smith could also miss the occasion, as he was possibly concussed...

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