Mbovane back with BlitzBokke
The South African Rugby Union named a Springbok Sevens squad of 16 players for the warm-up tournament in Middelburg, which gets underway on Friday.
The event will be the only pre-season tournament where the BlitzBokke will be in action before they leave for Australia to kick-off the IRB Sevens World Series at the Gold Coast Sevens.
Promising wing Tshotsho Mbovane makes a welcome return to the squad after he was sidelined for a long period because of a knee injury.
Branco du Preez and Kyle Brown have also just recently completed their injury rehabilitation and although the pair are included in the squad, their involvement in the tournament will be limited.
South Africa will be in action against the likes of Wales, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and a host of local provincial selections.
Paul Treu, the Springbok Sevens coach, said his squad was looking forward to get their season underway in Middelburg.
"We are excited about this season because the Sevens World Series will again be a very tough tournament, and we also have the Sevens Rugby World Cup to look forward to next year in Russia."
The SA Sevens management team worked extremely hard during the off-season to get a cluster of injured players back into shape for what promises to be another thrilling international season of Sevens Rugby.
"We will be twice in action against Wales, the defending World Cup champions, over the coming weekend. They are a quality side so I am looking forward to test our guys against them.
"We are going to make full use of this tournament because it is the only time that we will be in action before we leave for the Gold Coast. Our management team has worked overtime to get the players ready after the squad suffered many injuries at the end of last season," added Treu.
South Africa: Kyle Brown, Chris Dry, Steven Hunt, Cheslin Kolbe, Paul Delport, Cecil Afrika, Tshotsho Mbovane, Branco du Preez, Stephan Dippenaar, Albertus Smith, Frankie Horne, Craig Barry, Cornal Hendricks, Bernardo Botha, Pieter Engelbrecht, Reuben Johannes.
