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The magnificent 7 Sale Sharks being sent to Springboks training camp

Faf de Klerk /Getty

Steve Diamond has revealed Sale Sharks will be sending seven players to join the Springboks training squad – minus the injured Lood de Jager – which will affect his squad for the start of next season’s Gallagher Premiership and Heineken European Cup.

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Diamond has recruited heavily from South Africa and with Springbok assistant coach Felix Jones now based in Dublin to monitor the European based players, their form has seen an unprecedented call up from Sale who are second the Gallagher Premiership.

However, World Cup winner Lood de Jager will not be travelling back to South Africa as he is preparing to discover how long his latest shoulder injury will keep him out of the game. De Jager was injured in the 40-31 win over Leicester and will have another scan today on the shoulder to reveal the extent of what is believed to be ligament damage.

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Diamond accepts he will have to operate without those seven players during the November test period but is confident his squad can still be competitive in the Premiership and the Heineken Champions Cup fixtures that will be played. The seven are; Rohan Janse van Rensburg, Faf de Klerk, Coenie Oosthuizen, Akker van der Merwe, Dan, Rob and Jean-Luc du Preez.

Diamond said: “There will be seven players minus Lood going to join the Springbok squad. Lood will have his scan this afternoon and the x-rays are positive and there doesn’t seem to be any distress but we will wait for the MRI scan and get him to see one of the specialists. I am fairly optimistic but he won’t be playing in the next tens days and it looks there is no structural damage but there may be some ligament damage.

Diamond Sale de Jager
Sale Sharks Springboks lock Lood de Jager (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

“Rohan is playing well and he is on the Springbok radar because has been called up to the squad going to join their training camp at the end of our season or after the play-offs. Every South African I have got with the exception of Cobus Wiese has been called up including Akker and Coenie. We don’t lose them until the end of the season and as Rob Baxter said ( about the start of next season) we have two league games and two European games and something has to give.

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“Equally so, my Dirty Dozen as I call my mid-week team went out and beat Wasps who are beating everybody at the moment. I have a good squad that will scrap in those first two games if I haven’t got the South African players. “

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AM 7 minutes ago
'Freelancer' Izaia Perese shows the need for true inclusivity in Australian rugby

That's Cron's job though. Australia has had one of the most penalised scrums in international rugby for a long time. Just look at the scrum win loss percentage and scrum penalties. That is your evidence. AA has been the starter during that period. Pretty simple analysis. That Australia has had a poor scrum for a long time is hardly news. If bell and thor are not on the field they are woeful. So you are just plain wrong. They have very little time for the lions so doing the same old things that dont work is not going to get them there.


Ainsley is better than our next best tighthead options and has been playing well at scrum time for Lyon in the most competitive comp in the world. Superstar player? No. But better than the next best options. So that is a good enough guide. The scrummaging in the Prem is pretty good too so there is Sio's proof. Same analysis for him. Certainly better in both cases than Super, where the brumbies had the worst win loss and scrum pen in Super. Who plays there? Ohh yes... And the level of scrummaging in Super is well below the URC, prem and France with the SA teams out.


Nongorr is truly woeful. He's 130kg and gets shoved about. That just should not be happening at that weight for a specialist prop who has always played rugby cf pone with leauge. He has had enough time to develop at 23. You'd be better off with Pone who is at least good around the field for the moment and sending Nongorr on exchange to France or England to see if they can improve him with better coaching as happened with Skelton and Meafou. He isn't going to develop in time in super if he has it at all.


Latu is a better scrummaging hooker than BPA and Nasser. and he's the best aussie player over the ball at ruck time. McReight's super jackling percentage hasnt converted to international level but latu consistently does it at heniken level, which is similar to test level in the big games. With good coaching at La Rochelle he's much improved though still has the odd shocker. He should start the November games.

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