Cheetahs not underestimating Sunwolves

Cape Town - Cheetahs coach Franco Smith says they will by no means be underestimating the Sunwolves in their Super Rugby clash on Saturday.

The Cheetahs and Sunwolves will make history on Saturday as the first teams to play a Super Rugby match in Singapore.

This will mark the first match between the Cheetahs and Sunwolves in the competition, and the Sunwolves’ second outing in their debut season.

They lost their first match 26-13 to the Lions in Tokyo, but the Cheetahs also started the season on a negative note, going down at home to the Jaguares (34-33) and Stormers (20-10).

The Cheetahs have won only one of their last eight matches against teams from outside of South Africa and Smith is taking nothing for granted ahead of Saturday’s clash.

“We surely won’t underestimate the Sunwolves. In fact, we are expecting another big challenge. The focus is on what we can do better as a team, and we will measure ourselves against that,” said Smith.

Saturday’s clash at Singapore National Stadium is scheduled for 12:55 (SA time).

Teams:

Sunwolves

15 Riaan Viljoen, 14 Akihito Yamada, 13 Harumichi Tatekawa, 12 Yu Tamura, 11 Yasutaka Sasakura, 10 Tusi Pisi, 9 Atsushi Hiwasa, 8 Edward Quirk, 7 Andrew Durutalo, 6 Liaki Moli, 5 Hitoshi Ono, 4 Timothy Vond, 3 Shinnosuke Kakinaga, 2 Shota Horie (captain), 1 Keith Inagaki.

Substitutes: 16 Takeshi Kizu, 17 Masataka Mikami, 18 Takuma Asahara, 19 Shinya Makabe, 20 Yoshiya Hosoda, 21 Kaito Shigeno, 22 Derek Carpenter, 23 Mifiposeti Paea

Cheetahs

15 Sias Ebersohn, 14 Sergeal Petersen, 13 Francois Venter, 12 William Small-Smith, 11 Raymond Rhule, 10 Niel Marais, 9 Shaun Venter, 8 Henco Venter, 7 Uzair Cassiem, 6 Paul Schoeman, 5 Francois Uys, 4 Carl Wegner, 3 Johan Coetzee, 2 Jacques du Toit, 1 Ox Nche 

Substitutes: 16 Torsten van Jaarsveld, 17 Charles Marais, 18 Maks van Dyk, 19 Reniel Hugo, 20  Hilton Lobberts, 21 Boom Prinsloo, 22 Tian Meyer, 23 Fred Zeilinga