Namibia take on powerful Bulls

Namibia’s national rugby side will be in action for the last time at home, before they leave for the World Cup, when they host the Blue Bulls at Vegkop Stadium tomorrow afternoon. 

Blue Bulls’ Director of Rugby and former Springboks world cup winning coach, Jake White, has assembled a strong squad for the match that includes some exciting upcoming youngsters, as well as several players who recently joined the Bulls from other franchises. 

White has selected a very young captain in lock forward Reinhardt Ludwig, who turns 21 the day after the match, while other promising young forwards include flanker WJ Steenkamp (22 years old), lock Deon Slabbert (23), who joined the Bulls from the Pumas; and eighthman Mpilo Gumede (23), who joined the Bulls from the Sharks.

There is a lot of pace amongst the backs in wingers Stravino Jacobs and Sibongile Novuka, and fullback Sergeal Petersen, who recently joined the Bulls from the Stormers, and has represented South Africa u20 and an SA A-side before. 

The only Springbok in the side is the 35-year-old three-quarter Cornal Hendriks who was capped 12 times for the Boks during 2014-15, while he will be partnered at centre by Chris Smit, who previously played for the Free State Cheetahs. 

Zak Burger, who represented SA u20 five years ago starts at scrumhalf, while his 29-year-old halfback partner Jaco van der Walt is an interesting choice at flyhalf. 

He was selected for the South African Schools side in 2011 and 2012 and went on to make 40 appearances for the Golden Lions before being signed by Scottish Pro14 side Edinburgh in 2017. He went on to represent them in nearly 100 matches over six years, scoring 471 points, while he was also capped twice by Scotland in 2020-21, after serving his three-year residency for Scottish eligibility. He has since returned to South Africa, and will make his debut for the Bulls tomorrow. 

The Namibian Rugby Union had not released the Namibian team by deadline yesterday, but it can be expected that coach Allister Coetzee will give a few fringe players a run to build depth and experience. 

Cliven Loubser, who established himself as Namibia’s first choice flyhalf over the past world cup cycle, has been out for a lengthy period due to injury, with Tiaan Steenkamp getting the nod at flyhalf on Namibia’s recent Nations Cup tour. Loubser has, however, recovered and Coetzee earlier this week indicated that he will get game time.

“Not everyone got an opportunity to play overseas and some of the players played off the bench most of the time, so this is an ideal opportunity to give them a start. A player like Cliven Loubser has just come back from injury, he didn’t tour with us, so he will definitely be in the mix as well to start this game,” he said. 

“Our standby players had an opportunity this week to train with the group and we’ll also give them a bit of game time at a higher intensity, but the focus will be to get two weeks preparation for our first match at the world cup against Italy,” he added. 

Meanwhile, the CEO of the Namibia Rugby Union, John Heynes yesterday admitted that they would take a financial knock after the match had to be moved to WHS’s Vegkop Stadium, due to the Heroes Day celebrations at the Independence Stadium, which led to the adjacent Hage Geingob National Rugby Stadium’s unavailability due to security concerns. 

“We will definitely lose income, big time. All our suites at the Hage Geingob Stadium were sold out but we had to remunerate about half of them who opted not to go to Vegkop. I’d say Vegkop’s capacity is about 40 percent of Hage Geingob’s capacity, which has a maximum capacity of about 10 000,” he said.  

The match kicks off at 16h00 and Heynes urged rugby fans to arrive well in time to avoid traffic problems.

“Parking will be difficult and one of the roads will be closed down. The main parking area will be at the top on the open space above Windhoek High School, but there is also parking in front of the school and on the school grounds,” he said. 

Tickets for the match cost N$130 per person and can be obtained via the App Kudukey. 

Namibian squad 

The Namibian squad which was released just before deadline is as follows:

15 Andre van der Berg, 14 Gerswin Mouton, 13 Alcino Izaacs, 12 Le Roux Malan, 11 Chad Plato, 10 Cliven Loubser, 9 Jacques Theron, 8 Adriaan Booysen, 7 Max Katjijeko, 6 PJ van Lill (captain), 5 Tiaan de Klerk, 4 Mahepisa Tjeriko, 3 Aranos Coetzee, 2 Wicus Jacobs, 1 Andre Rademeyer. 

Substitutes: 

16 Louis van der Westhuizen, 17 Casper Viviers, 18 Herman Agenbag, 19 Haitembu Shifuka, 20 Ruan Ludick, 21 Peter Diergaardt, 22 Johan Luttig, 23 Obert Nortje, 24 Oela Blaauw, 25 Lesley Klim, 26 Lloyd Jacobs, 27 Hillian Beukes, 28 Danco Burger. 

Vodacom Blue Bulls squad:

1. Dylan Smith, 2. Jan-Hendrik Wessels, 3. Robert Hunt, 4. Deon Slabbert, 5. Reinhardt Ludwig (c), 6. WJ Steenkamp, 7. Mihlali Mosi, 8. Mpilo Gumede, 9. Zak Burger, 10. Jaco van der Walt, 11. Stravino Jacobs, 12. Chris Barend Smit, 13. Cornal Hendricks, 14. Sibongile Novuka, 15. Sergeal Petersen.

IMPACT SQUAD: 16. Jacques van Rooyen, 17. Tiaan Lange, 18. Simphiwe Matanzima, 19. Ruan Venter, 20. Phumzile Maqondwana, 21. Bernard van der Linde, 22. Cameron Hanekom, 23. Juan Mostert, 24. Eugene Hare, 25. Kabelo Mokoena.