Four crippling blows for Lions
The Golden Lions have suffered four crippling injuries to key players in the last few days, two of them at training on Tuesday.
Lions coach Johan Ackermann, speaking to rugby365 ahead of his team's Currie Cup crunch encounter with the table-topping and unbeaten Western Province in Johannesburg on Saturday, revealed a list of injuries growing at an alarming rate.
Scrumhalf Ross Cronje (knee) and star loose forward Derick Minnie (badly damaged finger ligaments) will both be sidelined for about three weeks, after sustaining injuries in the team's 26-36 loss to the Blue Bulls last Saturday.
And on Tuesday it got worse, much worse.
Midfielder Alwyn Hollenbach injured his calf in training and is likely to also miss the Round Six encounter with WP.
Ackermann said they are awaiting the results of his scans before making call.
The biggest problem is that another of the team's start forwards, flank Jaco Kriel, was also injured in training on Tuesday and has been sent for scans.
"We will know by tomorrow [Wednesday] what the diagnoses is," Ackermann told rugby365, adding that they are hoping it is just a calf muscle injury and not something more sinister like a fractured leg – which some pitchside observers suggested it looked like.
The Lions mentor explained that they had a contact session against the Under-21 team and described it is "freak injuries" and not a case of a wild training session gone wrong.
"It is one of those unforeseen things," he said.
"Jaco [Kriel] got his leg badly caught between a couple of players and Alwyn damaged his calf when he accelerated.
"It is terrible, we've had four injuries in three days – two at the weekend against the Bulls and another two in training."
Ackermann now has a few important decisions to make before naming his team on Thursday.
If Hollenbach is sidelined, as is expected, it will affect the composition of his backline.
However, at scrumhalf the decision is much clearer.
"[Western Province import] Ricky [Schroeder] will get his chance," Ackermann said, adding: "He is set to start.
"Michael Bondesio is close to being ready, so he could be on the bench this week. Obviously he hasn't played in a very long time [as a result of several injuries this year].
"I feel that [fullback] Andries Coetzee did a great job when he took over at scrumhalf [against the Blue Bulls] last week. There was one box-kick error, but for the rest he was very good."
Ackermann said he still has to make a call whether to bring Bondesio in straight away or give him another week to improve his conditioning.
"However, Ricky will get his chance to start, he has been working hard and waiting a long time for it."
By Jan de Koning
