Springboks primed for another major blow as Elrigh Louw limps off in Bulls victory

The Springboks, and to a lesser extent the Bulls, were dealt potentially massive blow after Elrigh Louw had to leave the field with an ankle injury during the final 10 minutes of Friday night's 44-22 URC victory over Benetton in Treviso.

The rampaging 23-year-old flanker, who's been a fulcrum of the Bulls' pack and made some promising cameos in the national team this year, went for a scan afterwards, but franchise director of rugby Jake White suggested that his hopes of going on the year-end tour to Europe look remote.

"He said that he heard something go," said the Bulls mentor, counterintuitively pointing out that might not be the worst thing.

"It sounds weird, but it's not necessarily a bad thing. Generally, when you get syndesmosis [a joint where two bones are held together by ligaments] you don't hear anything and that's usually an eight-week injury."

As a result, White hopes that indicates some good news at least to the Bulls' cause.

"Hopefully it's not too serious. If it's something that we can give a bit of time before getting him back on the field, it should be good," he said.

"I very much doubt Elrigh will be available to run on Monday, but we have one game left and then four weeks off so if he misses [the Sharks encounter next Sunday], by the end of November he might just be available again."

Meanwhile, the franchises that have players called up to the Springbok training camp in Stellenbosch - which starts on Sunday - will have to wait until Wednesday to be certain of their participation in next weekend's round of fixtures before the international break.

"Yeah, so they all assemble and by Wednesday, whoever isn't selected for the 25-man squad for the Ireland Test, which is the first game of the tour, will be sent