RWC Diary Day 14 - Boks 12 September, 2011

Flying Fijians training at Porirua Park.

Well judging by the media interest in us today we’re obviously playing one of the top teams this Saturday, and they don’t come much bigger than the defending Rugby World Cup (RWC) champions – South Africa. The good news for us is that after their titanic battle against Wales on Sunday evening the Boks have a couple of players ruled out through injury for their game against Fiji; most notably towering lock forward Victor Matfield.

The Flying Fijians coaching team is obviously quite pleased to have seen the two teams batter each other like they did on Sunday night, a situation which assistant coach Shannon Fraser believes could be advantageous for Fiji.

“Both sides showed their hand a little bit in relation to the style and the intent they’re going to play. I think they’ve both had a real good crack at each other which is to our benefit I guess,” Fraser said.

After two weeks of relatively pleasant (albeit cold) weather to train in, today was the first abysmal weather day with rain and clouds dominating,, though Fraser believes the team’s performance and focus will not be affected by the conditions.

“At the moment we’re not letting that play on us, we’re focusing very much on our own preparation. We’re focusing on making the required adjustments from our last performance, our tactical application for this game, so it’s not enjoyable weather but we’re hoping the sun might appear pretty soon.”

The fact Fiji has no major injuries ahead of Saturday’s all important clash against the Boks is good news indeed for the coaching staff.

“Full credit to the medical and strength and conditioning staff that the bodies seem to be in pretty good shape, as we took a bit of a battering against Namibia.”

Also good news for the team is the fact Michael Foley returns to coach and guide Fiji’s forwards through the important clash against South Africa. In this regard there’s no doubt South Africa will have in the back of their minds what happened when the two sides last met in the RWC in 2007.

It’s something Fiji will be banking upon.

Until tomorrow, moce mada. 

View the Flying Fijians RWC 2011 photo gallery.

Related articles:

RWC Diary Day 12 - Namibia 

RWC Diary Day 13 - Wellington