The Coach invited more than 60 of the country’s top players to this week’s training camp in Johannesburg and is satisfied that his dual target can be achieved.

With the exception of Bulls players involved in the United Rugby Championship final, Erasmus gained some firsthand knowledge this week of what he has available to fulfill his ambitious task.

His big goal is another World Cup victory in 2027 and he wants players in that squad with enough experience.

“If you look too far ahead, you forget about the present. So, we want to try and win all the games and go with the mindset of winning all the games and that’s not being arrogant but for sure we are not only going to use 25 or 27 players this year, the plan is not only to broaden squad depth but also experience, so that when we get to the next world cup hopefully we don’t have a lot of players with caps under 15,” says Erasmus.

The first challenge is against the Barbarians in Cape Town on the 28th of this month.

“We want to start on a good foot, I coached the Barbarians, a lot of these players played for the Barbarians, the setup is that the shackles are off and they have to play entertaining rugby. So, there’s not a lot of analysis we can do on them so we will focus a lot on ourselves for that game and there will be opportunities for players that played in Japan and to get a few of the other guys that hasn’t played for the Springboks,” Erasmus adds.

After the Barbarians the Springboks will take on Italy and Georgia in July.

--SABC--