The Junior Springboks got their short tour of Georgia off to a good but cold start with a live training session against the Lelo Saracens club in Tbilisi on Wednesday afternoon.
The SA U20s have experienced sub-zero and snowy conditions since their arrival in the Georgian capital on Monday, but they are taking the freezing temperatures in their stride and went about undeterred with their preparations.
On Wednesday, the Junior Boks encountered snow – vastly different to the high temperatures at their base in Stellenbosch in recent weeks – when they left for the Lelo Saracens club.
The SA U20s had a good workout of about one hour against the club’s senior men’s team and afterwards, Junior Bok coach Kevin Foote said he could already see value in the tour.
“It was a nice hit out today and we are grateful for Lelo Saracens for hosting us in such a splendid way,” said Foote.
“It’s bitterly cold out here – probably minus two degrees when we left for the field – but that (the challenging weather conditions) is very good for our boys’ mentality, because it’s something we cannot control, unlike our preparations and our performances.”
Foote said the tour squad started with about 50 minutes of training in units (backs and forwards separately), performing live lineouts, scrums and mauls against their hosts, with the effort and performance of the youngsters leaving their coach a satisfied man afterwards.
“I was very impressed with our scrum efforts today,” said Foote.
“I thought our pack did well, and our lineout is obviously something that we focus on a lot, alongside our mauls and maul defence. The players also did some set-piece defence, attack, and some skills work, and then we got together for our team rugby session.
“We are also working hard on our execution, which is another big focus area for us, making sure we all know our roles and what good execution looks like. All our coaches, Melusi Mthethwa and Lumumba Currie (assistant coaches), as well as Johan Ackermann (coaching consultant) did a great job.”
The time together in a foreign environment is proving to be a good factor for the Junior Boks as they continue with their preparations for the rest of the season.
Following Wednesday’s live training session against the club side, the Junior Boks will now turn their attention to the two outings against their Georgian U20 counterparts.
“I couldn’t be prouder of how the management staff and players are getting together, and we really looking forward to our hit-out against the Georgian U20 side on Sunday, which we expect will be tough opposition,” said Foote.
“It’s been a good camp so far, we’ve trained hard in tough conditions and Thulani Nteta (strength and conditioning coach) is making us do some great fitness work, to make sure we are well conditioned.
“I feel we are getting our combinations right, as well as our game model. We got some work to do on our fifteen versus fifteen scenarios, but I really feel that we are making good progress.”
Rolling subs will be used in Sunday’s match against the Georgia U20s, which will allow Foote the opportunity to give all the members of the touring squad game time.
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