Springbok captain Corne Krige will miss the opening World Cup match against Uruguay as a precaution after suffering an injury in training.
Coach Rudi Straeuli said Krige would return to the side for South Africa’s crunch pool C match against England next week.
”It’s not really serious,” said Straeuli. ”He had a cramp in training last night. We pulled him off and had him in ice but he’ll definitely be ready for next week. It’s a setback in preparations but other players have trained with us.”
Joe van Niekerk replaces Krige on the side of the scrum in a strong team to be led by veteran scrumhalf Joost van der Westhuizen.
Van der Westhuizen is the sole survivor from the South African team which played Uruguay in the 1999 World Cup in Scotland.
Thirteen of the 22-man squad for this game played in the Springboks previous test — a brave defeat to New Zealand in August.
Straeuli has given test debuts to centre Jaque Fourie and flanker Danie Rossouw and retained flyhalf Louis Koen against highly rated, yet uncapped, Derick Hougaard.
Fullback Werner Greeff will play his first test since the loss to England in November and injuries restricted him to just seven Super 12 matches this year.
”It’s a very strong side we’ve put out,” Straeuli said. ”We might have one or two changes (for England) but every South African side should be a strong side.
The selection comes on a day when the racism scandal which has enveloped the team reared up again.
A dossier from the Springboks former media manager Mark Keohane, which was enough to spark a post-World Cup inquiry, was leaked to a South African website and newspaper.
According to the leaked documents, Keohane claims black Springboks in the national squad had been made to feel ”dirty and inferior” following an alleged racial incident involving white second row forward Geo Cronje and black counterpart Quinton Davids.
Both men were left out of the squad.
Van der Westhuizen said the leaked report would not disrupt the sense of unity in the World Cup squad.
”I’ve been expecting it,” he said. ”You could see it’s a guy (Keohane) who’s not used to being in a team environment.
”These things are typical South African where one individual wants to use the emotional state of the team to prove something to people out there. What he doesn’t realise is that it brings the team much closer to each other.”
Lineup: Werner Greeff, Ashwin Willemse, Jaque Fourie, De Wet Barry, Thinus Delport; Louis Koen, Joost van der Westhuizen (captain); Lawrence Sephaka, Danie Coetzee, Richard Bands; Bakkies Botha, Victor Matfield; Joe van Niekerk, Danie Rossouw, Juan Smith.
Replacements: John Smit, Faan Rautenbach, Selborne Boome, Hendro Scholtz, Neil de Kock, Derick Hougaard, Ricardo Loubscher. – Sapa-AP