Boks’ place in Rugby Championship still up in the air

The Springboks’ participation in this year’s Rugby Championship is still in the balance.

SA Rugby announced on Saturday that they will make a decision on the world champions’ participation in the four-nation event early next week.

Although the Springboks are due to defend their title in Australia between November 7 and December 12‚ several hurdles needed to be cleared if it is to be confirmed.

“The South African government lifted the ban on international sporting participation a week ago and directions to manage such participation were published on Wednesday evening‚” SA Rugby said in a statement.

A spokesman said that SA Rugby was seeking further clarification from the departments of Arts‚ Sports and Culture and of Transport as to how those regulations would impact on the planned participation.

“A final decision was only likely to be finalised early next week once those clarifications had been assessed internally and with SA Rugby’s Sanzaar partners‚” SA Rugby added in the statement.

The Springboks have not played since they won the Rugby World Cup final in Japan last November. New Zealand and Australia‚ however‚ were due to play their first Test of the year on Sunday morning (5am SA time) in Wellington.