Boks’ Ox Nché expects England scrum to be physical and backline on the ball

Ox Nché has been eating “mostly steak” this week ahead of the Test against England on Saturday, but the powerful loosehead prop warned on Tuesday not to underestimate the visitors’ scrum.

The world champions take on the English in their opening match of the inaugural Nations Championship at Ellis Park .

England finished second from the bottom in the Six Nations with only one victory to their name, a dismal performance that has some pundits predicting an easy game for the home side.

But 47-cap veteran Nché — like coach Rassie Erasmus and other players — is speaking about the opposition with respect, pointing to the standard of rugby played in their recently completed premiership.

“They’re a pretty exciting bunch of guys,” Nché told a press conference in Johannesburg on Tuesday afternoon.

“We’ve watched the Northampton Saints, Bath — the English Premiership has just been pretty exciting so I think they have a lot of youngsters that have played a lot of games for England. I think it’s a team that’s full of energy.

“They’re going to definitely man-up upfront, try to be physical.

“They have a lot of energy. They have a lot of exciting wings, they have a lot of variation to the game as well.

“It’s not like we all used to know them, stick to one thing — I think when they see opportunities on, they have all the talent and youngsters to maybe finish an opportunity when it arises.

“I think they’re a pretty sharp team,” added Nché, replying to a question, based on his own cake-and-steak joke about his diet, that he had been eating a lot of steak.

If you look at those [England] players, we are under no illusions … we know what we’re getting into on Saturday

—  Rassie Erasmus

Erasmus, who rates the English scrum highly too, is refusing to dismiss England as easy opposition. “They’ve lost five on the trot and I guess that’s why people immediately will think ‘they are in trouble’.

“But from experience myself … a week is a long time. We lost 57-0 against New Zealand away and then the next weekend it was a two-point game,” he said, referring to Rugby Championship matches played in 2017.

“Five months after we got smashed [20-35 to New Zealand in 2023], we went to the World Cup and won it. Last year Australia, they smashed us at Ellis Park, and we went on to the win the Rugby Championship.

“We are under no illusions that if you just look at stats and you don’t analyse the opposition 100% and you just look at newspaper articles and look at a few TikTok things and Instagram things or a few podcasters, then it’s easy to form an opinion and just go with the flow.

“If you look at those [England] players, we are under no illusions … we know what we’re getting into on Saturday.”

TimesLIVE