Caption writer causes chaos at SARU

The South African Rugby Union produced some extraordinary cover-defence on Thursday, when a mistake by a caption writer caused a mad scramble at Springbok headquarters.

SARU, in a statement, advised the media that a caption and subsequent Tweet, sent out by photo agency Gallo Images, claiming that Rassie Erasmus had been appointed as technical advisor to the Springboks, was “devoid of any truth”.

Erasmus, who worked with the Springboks in that capacity at last year’s Rugby World Cup, recently – and suddenly – resigned as Senior Professional Coach of Western Province.

In the statement, SARU explained that the pictures were taken by News24 to accompany a feature on Erasmus, following his departure from WP. The story appeared in the Rapport newspaper this past Sunday.

The images were loaded from News24 onto the Gallo Images website, during which process a caption appeared that erroneously claimed that Erasmus – who has been linked to various jobs since his resignation – had been appointed by the South African Rugby Union.

In the statement issued, SARU said they had sought an “explanation”, from Gallo, about the mistake.

The picture agency has also since corrected the caption but not before we stumbled onto the error.

Gallo’s big error:

…and their quick fix!