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Cape Town - Springbok captain Jean de Villiers says his team had a good week of preparation to start their Rugby World Cup campaign and can’t wait to get going against Japan in Brighton on Saturday.
The Boks wrapped up their preparations on a sunny afternoon at the Brighton Community Stadium on Friday afternoon.
De Villiers, who will lead the Springboks for the 36th time, equalling Gary Teichmann as the second most capped Springbok captain, said his side will be looking to start with a win on Saturday and to starting building momentum for the rest of the tournament.
“It has been a good week from a preparation point of view and we could not have asked for more,” said De Villiers.
“We had a good couple weeks training in South Africa, but this week the vibe picked up, as well as the attention to detail.
“I’ve been at World Cups before where we’ve done the bulk of our preparation in South Africa, and once you get to the tournament you start the fine tuning – working on small things on a weekly basis, taking into account the opposition, our team and how we want to play.
“But I’ve also seen that the more rugby changes, the more it stays the same.”
De Villiers said the Boks have studied Japan before their first game ever against the Brave Blossoms.
“We have seen the strengths of the Japanese, as well as some weaknesses, like you do with every other team in the world, we’d like to expose those weaknesses tomorrow,” said De Villiers.
“At the same time we know what our strengths and weaknesses are, so we need to ensure we get momentum in the way we play, execute what we’re working on and progress as a team.
“We definitely won’t put a score on it – our first goal is to start the World Cup with a win and also tick some boxes to see if we can reap rewards in way we play.”
The match against Japan kicks off at 17:45.
Teams:
South Africa:
15 Zane Kirchner, 14 Bryan Habana, 13 Jesse Kriel, 12 Jean de Villiers (captain), 11 Lwazi Mvovo, 10 Pat Lambie, 9 Ruan Pienaar, 8 Schalk Burger, 7 Willem Alberts, 6 Francois Louw, 5 Victor Matfield, 4 Lood de Jager, 3 Jannie du Plessis, 2 Bismarck du Plessis, 1 Tendai Mtawarira
Substitutes: 16 Adriaan Strauss, 17 Trevor Nyakane, 18 Coenie Oosthuizen, 19 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 20 Siya Kolisi, 21 Fourie du Preez, 22 Handre Pollard, 23 JP Pietersen
Japan:
15 Ayumu Goromaru, 14 Akihito Yamada, 13 Male Sau, 12 Craig Wing, 11 Kotaro Matsushima, 10 Kosei Ono, 9 Fumiaki Tanaka, 8 Hendrik Tui, 7 Michael Broadhurst, 6 Michael Leitch, 5 Hitoshi Ono, 4 Luke Thompson, 3 Kensuke Hatakeyama, 2 Shota Horie, 1 Masataka Mikami
Substitutes: 16 Takeshi Kazu, 17 Keita Inagaki, 18 Hiroshi Yamashita, 19 Shinya Makabe, 20. Amanaki Mafi, 21 Atsushi Hiwasa, 22 Harumichi Tatekawa, 23 Karne Hesketh
