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Lions upset with Coetzee

Cape Town - Golden Lions president Kevin de Klerk is upset after Western Province and Stormers coach Allister Coetzee hinted he might look at luring a few Lions players for next year's Super Rugby competition.

WP take on the Golden Lions in a Currie Cup clash in Johannesburg on Saturday and with the Lions out of the reckoning for next year's Super Rugby, some of their players could be the target of other unions. Players like Elton Jantjies, Pat Cilliers, Franco van der Merwe, Josh Strauss, JC Janse van Rensburg and Jaco Taute could well be targeted.

Coetzee admitted earlier this week they might be interested in luring a player or two from the Johannesburg-team.

"Some of the other franchise-teams will look to see if players will be available due to the Lions not playing Super Rugby," Coetzee was reported as saying.

"Elton Jantjies is a player who has an exit-clause in his contract if the Lions do not play in the Super-series."

De Klerk admitted to Beeld that there are "one or two players with such (exit) clauses" in their contracts. However, he wasn't all that happy about Coetzee's statement.

"I really like Allister a lot, but I'm absolutely stunned that he made such an opportunistic statement. Where is the spirit of sport and the respect between us? What's going on here is not sport.

"What happened to us was not our decision.

"I'm asking politely that they (the other unions) just portray a little bit of etiquette," said De Klerk.

The Lions-WP clash at Coca-Cola Park kicks off at 17:05 on Saturday.
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