SA Schools sides named after successful Craven Week

Following a successful Craven Week that ended in George on Saturday, the SA Schools selectors named two squads of 23 players each to represent the SA Schools and SA Schools ‘A’.

Western Province, with 14 players in the two squads, have the largest representation. There are also eight players from Free State, seven from the Golden Lions, six from the Sharks, five from Eastern Province, three from the Blue Bulls and one each from SWD, Boland and Border.

Seven players who featured in the SA Schools or U18 teams last year were also included: JC Mars, JT Strydom, Jameel de Jongh, Divan Fuller, Danio Botha, Ulrich van der Westhuizen and Christian Everett.

The squads will assemble at Hoër Landbouskool Boland near Paarl on Sunday, where they will prepare to take on each other at the school’s field later in the week. Apart from training, a blazer presentation ceremony will also be held.

The management teams of both squads have also been confirmed. Lynch (Golden Lions) will be assisted by James Winstanley (Eastern Province), while Heinrich Martin (Western Province) will be assisting Zangqa (Border). Cobus van Dyk (Blue Bulls) will act as scrum coach for both sides.

The match is scheduled to kick off at Boland Landbou at 15h00 on Thursday afternoon. Players who were selected for the SA U18 Sevens team for the Commonwealth Youth Games next month, were not considered for these teams.

Teams:

SA Schools:

15 JC Mars (Western Province, Paarl Boys High), 14 Luyanda Kunene (Sharks, Maritzburg College), 13 Demitre Erasmus (Blue Bulls, Garsfontein). 12 Janco Purchase (Blue Bulls, Affies), 11 Jameel de Jongh (Western Province, Paarl Boys High), 10 Ian van der Merwe (Free State, Grey College), 9 Haashim Pead (Western Province, Bishops), 8 JJ