Wales have never beaten the Springboks in SA — and they won’t do so in July’s three-Test series. It will be 3-0 to Siya Kolisi’s world champions.
Welsh coach Wayne Pivac named his strongest and most experienced players for the visit to SA, when many were expecting him to rest the veterans and use the series as an opportunity to build depth to the squad for the 2023 World Cup.
Pivac obviously had a change of heart given the Welsh regional quartet’s humiliation in SA in this season’s United Rugby Championship, with the four Welsh teams combining for eight successive defeats. The average score favoured SA’s four URC teams 43-13.
It is an average score consistent with the history of the Welsh national team in SA. Wales have never won in 10 Tests and the Springboks average winning score is 41-15.
It took Wales 93 years to win for the first time against the Springboks and while their recent history is far healthier with four wins in the last six Tests, they have not played any of those six Tests in SA.
Wales will be competitive but they won’t come within 15 points of the Springboks in any of the three Tests, with two of them being played at altitude and the final one at the DHL Stadium in Cape Town on July 16.
Who knows just how many of the original squad of 33 will be available for the final Test, but on reflection those Welsh players who missed out may well feel there is more individual 2023 World Cup gain from not being part of a team taking a beating in July.
Wales will be competitive but they won’t come within 15 points of the Springboks in any of the three Tests.
Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber and national director of rugby Rassie Erasmus, by way of the national alignment squad selections, will also not be experimenting against Wales with a bunch of kids. There will be a sprinkling of South African URC talent introduced to Test rugby in 21 year-old loose-forwards Elrigh Louw and Evan Roos, but this is a series the Bok coaches want to win comprehensively, especially after the toil of the 2021 home Test series win against the British and Irish Lions.
Several of the Lions will be back in SA in the red of Wales, most notably flyhalf and captain Dan Biggar and veteran lock Alun Wyn Jones, who miraculously continues to make more comebacks from injury than Lazarus did from the grave; comebacks it must be acknowledged that are no less impressive than that of Lazarus.
Jones in the past year has defied science in how he has fought back from serious injury to go straight into Test rugby, but it is questionable as to why he is even touring. It is no secret that Pivac wants Jones to play in the 2023 World Cup, but there is little to gain from having him in SA if the bigger play is France next year.
Wales battled in the Six Nations and were humiliated at home by losing to Italy.
The embarrassment won’t be as jarring in SA but it will be no less painful when they take a three-zip beating from Springboks, who will use the series as their springboard to a successful Rugby Championship campaign.
There has been mixed reaction in Wales to Pivac’s squad picks, with many critical of his insistence in including so many old players.
The iconic Welsh and Lions midfielder Scott Gibbs, in a recent chat, said he hoped the innovation from Pivac would be in youngsters and that Welsh rugby would be a long-term beneficiary with such Test exposure for the next generation of Welsh internationals.
Instead Pivac has gone for the “same old” and the result will be the “same old”.
Wales will get pumped.
Wales squad
Forwards: Rhys Carre (Cardiff Rugby — 16 caps), Wyn Jones (Scarlets — 43 caps),
Gareth Thomas (Ospreys — 10 caps), Ryan Elias (Scarlets — 27 caps),
Dewi Lake (Ospreys — 5 caps), Sam Parry (Ospreys — 5 caps),
Leon Brown (Dragons — 22 caps), Tomas Francis (Ospreys — 64 caps),
Dillon Lewis (Cardiff Rugby — 38 caps), Adam Beard (Ospreys — 34 caps),
Ben Carter (Dragons — 6 caps), Alun Wyn Jones (Ospreys — 150 caps),
Will Rowlands (Dragons — 18 caps), Taine Basham (Dragons — 10 caps),
Taulupe Faletau (Bath Rugby — 89 caps), Dan Lydiate (Ospreys — 65 caps),
Josh Navidi (Cardiff Rugby — 30 caps), James Ratti (Cardiff Rugby — uncapped),
Tommy Reffell (Leicester Tigers — uncapped)
Backs: Gareth Davies (Scarlets — 67 caps), Kieran Hardy (Scarlets — 11 caps),
Tomos Williams (Cardiff Rugby — 33 caps), Gareth Anscombe (Ospreys — 31 caps), Dan Biggar (Northampton Saints — 100 caps), Rhys Patchell (Scarlets — 21 caps),
George North (Ospreys — 102 caps), Nick Tompkins (Saracens — 20 caps),
Owen Watkin (Ospreys — 31 caps), Johnny Williams (Scarlets — 5 caps),
Josh Adams (Cardiff Rugby — 39 caps), Alex Cuthbert (Ospreys — 51 caps),
Louis Rees-Zammit (Gloucester Rugby — 16 caps), Liam Williams (Scarlets — 78 caps)
Mark Keohane is the founder of keo.co.za, a multiple award-winning sports writer and the digital content director at Highbury Media., Twitter @mark_keohane.
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