LONG READ Rassie's masterplan to future-proof Springboks for sustained success

Rassie Erasmus and SA Rugby have taken bold steps to strengthen the nation’s depth and increase the chances of the Springboks remaining at the Test pinnacle for years to come.

While the 2027 World Cup remains South Africa’s priority, there’s a good chance that the team that travels to the 2031 tournament will be their strongest unit yet.

Erasmus invited 49 South Africa-based players to the first national alignment camp of the season, while a further 21 overseas-based Boks were invited to a virtual planning session.

Further analysis of the local group suggests that Erasmus will strike a greater balance between youth and experience in the lead-up to the 2027 World Cup.

Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Canan Moodie, Ethan Hooker and Jan-Hendrik Wessels are among South African rugby’s biggest success stories of the past two seasons and the selectors may expose even younger players to the rigours of Test rugby in the coming months.

Eleven uncapped players were invited to the alignment camp and further scrutiny of that particular group suggests Erasmus – who has extended his contract with SA Rugby to 2031 – is already planning for the next World Cup cycle.

There’s a chance that some of the Junior Boks who won the World Rugby U20 Championship in 2025 will force their way into the senior side this season and possibly travel to the 2027 World Cup.

At the very least, they will go into the next World Cup cycle with a clear idea of what to expect in the Erasmus-driven environment.

The same applies to promising teenagers like Markus Muller and Kai Pratt, who lit up the schoolboy rugby scene in 2025 and featured for the Junior Boks on the recent tour to Georgia.

Having spoken with Erasmus, the other South Africa coaches and some senior players at various planning sessions this past week, the precocious duo should be ideally placed to make the transition to professional rugby.

‘In a good space from the Springboks downwards’

Experience is the best teacher, and few understand the adage better than Erasmus himself.

Having been a Springbok player himself, a national technical advisor and South African rugby’s high performance manager, Erasmus has been exposed to all the strengths and weaknesses of the system over a period of 30 years.

Those experiences have shaped his coaching style as well as his strategy to build one of the most dominant Test teams the world has ever seen.

When one considers the wider group in 2026, it’s interesting to note how many of these players (37 of the 49) featured in the representative teams before going on to win their first Test cap.

In his capacity as high performance manager, Erasmus introduced the elite player development (EPD) programme back in 2014.

Players were identified, tracked and developed from the age of 16, and greater attempts were made to bring them through the school and age-group ranks to the SA Schools side, the Junior Boks and eventually the senior squad.

Damian Willemse, Manie Libbok, Salmaan Moerat and Johan Grobbelaar represented the SA Schools side in 2015 before making the step up to the SA U20s and eventually the Boks.

When one considers the wider group in 2026, it’s interesting to note how many of these players (37 of the 49) featured in the representative teams before going on to win their first Test cap.

However, the old system was far from perfect and for a long time, there was some concern regarding the drop-off between school and U20 level, and the fact the Junior Boks were perennially outplayed by New Zealand, France and others at the U20 Championship.

When Dave Wessels – the former Force and Rebels coach – was appointed as SA Rugby’s general manager for high performance in early 2024, he sought to bridge this gap. On the back of structural changes, the Junior Boks went on to win their first world title since 2012 last year.

More recently, SA Rugby has decided to revamp the junior pathways, with a new provincial U23 tournament kicking off this month, and an U20 competition replacing the previous U19 showpiece.

“We’re in a good space from the Springboks downwards in terms of high performance,” said SA Rugby CEO Rian Oberholzer on Monday. “Our structures are a looking a lot better than was the case a few years ago.

“The decision [to introduce an U23 tournament] is a high-performance decision, ensuring that more players [in that age group] get game time while they are not being used by their URC franchises.”

Junior Boks poised for senior exposure

Erasmus has had more than one reason to develop his squad in recent seasons. The unforgiving nature of the Test schedule – and the limited availability of players based overseas – has necessitated the selection of alternate line-ups, often on a weekly basis.

In 2026 the Boks will need a group of 40-plus players to navigate a particularly demanding schedule, which includes four consecutive Tests against the All Blacks in August and September and another four-game block at the back-end of the Nations Championship in November.

Another reason relates to an imbalance between youth and experience. While the Boks have got this balance right at the past two World Cups, they are in danger of taking a predominantly older squad to Australia in 2027.

Over the past two seasons, Erasmus has blooded 20 new caps – and 10 of those players have been 25 or younger at the time of their Test debuts.

Going forward, Erasmus will need to juggle the challenge of giving the likes of Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Hooker, Wessels, Jordan Hendrikse, Quan Horn, Cameron Hanekom and Zachary Porthen more game time with the push to explore other options across the age profiles.

Last season, Erasmus invited winger Cheswill Jooste, flanker Bathobele Hlekani and scrum-half Haashim Pead to train with the senior side following their success with the Junior Boks in Italy.

These players, as well as outside back Jaco Williams, went on to star for their respective URC franchises in subsequent months and – as the recent alignment camp squad list confirms – remain on the national radar.

Stormers prop Porthen (21) made his debut for the Boks last November, while Junior Boks hooker Esethu Mnebelele (20) would have featured against Wales if not for an untimely injury. Both may receive Test opportunities in the coming months as Erasmus looks to balance the front-row scales.

Skipper Riley Norton, a talented sportsman who also played for South Africa in the 2024 U19 Cricket World Cup, is back with the Junior Boks for a second stint, but the senior selectors see something in the versatile forward in terms of his skills and leadership.

Overall, it’s interesting to note how other members of the senior squad such as Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Stormers back-row Paul de Villiers and Porthen have captained the Junior Boks in recent seasons – and how Erasmus is building a leadership group for future seasons.

Schoolboy rugby booming in SA

The South African schoolboy rugby scene has exploded in recent years.

While the traditional powerhouses such as Affies, Grey College, Paarl Gymnasium, Paarl Boys and Paul Roos remain a force, a large number of less established schools have invested in their rugby programmes over the past few seasons.

The upshot is that the number of competitive rugby schools in South Africa has grown, and so has the pool of players with the potential to graduate to international level.

Josh Neill, who represented Rondebosch and SA Schools last year, has opted to further his career with the Leinster academy and recently featured for Ireland in the Six Nations U20 tournament.

Neill’s commitment to his adopted nation, as well as his comments about representing Ireland in future, haven’t gone down well in South Africa.

That said, the bulk of South Africa’s schoolboy stars have progressed to the next level of the local pyramid.

Outside centre Markus Muller scored 36 tries for Paarl Gym last season before going on to lead SA Schools, while loosehead prop Kai Pratt made an impression for Oakdale across a landmark season for the plucky Riversdale-based side.

Both have gone on to represent the Junior Boks and earn an invite to the senior alignment camp in Cape Town.

It’s not hard to imagine Pead – who shattered Antoine Dupont’s record for the most metres by a scrum-half at the U20 tournament in 2025 – playing alongside Feinberg-Mngomezulu at some point this season.

Stormers coach John Dobson has spoken about blooding these youngsters sooner rather than later at URC and Currie Cup level, while the Boks coaches have provided them with a detailed list of work-ons – essentially a road-map to Test selection further down the line.

It’s highly unlikely that the likes of Siya Kolisi, Eben Etzebeth and others aged 35 or older will press on with the Boks beyond the 2027 World Cup.

Erasmus has bolstered the team’s depth across the respective age profiles in order to cope with the inevitable departure of these legends, while SA Rugby has improved its junior structures to ensure that younger players make the transition to senior rugby sooner rather than later.

It’s not hard to imagine Pead – who shattered Antoine Dupont’s record for the most metres by a scrum-half at the U20 tournament in 2025 – playing alongside Feinberg-Mngomezulu at some point this season. At the very least, that half-back combination should be an option for the Boks at the 2031 World Cup in the USA.

Hooker and Moodie represent the present as well as the future of South African rugby, having played regularly for the Boks last season.

The versatile Wessels could be one of the team’s most important forwards at the next two World Cups, while the explosive Jooste and Jaco Williams will push for a place in an outside-backs contingent that already includes Cheslin Kolbe, Kurt-Lee Arendse and Edwill van der Merwe.

Erasmus’ Boks have won two consecutive Rugby World Cups and been far more consistent across the 2024 and 2025 Test seasons, winning 23 out of 27 Tests during that period.

And yet, with local coaches and administrators talking about significant improvements to the junior pathways, and more and more youngsters exposed to the senior systems in recent months, South African rugby is better placed than ever to achieve sustained success at the highest level.