Rassie: No Springbok players, management at fault for Covid-19 outbreak

• Springbok director of rugby Rassie Erasmus says nothing more could have been done to prevent an outbreak of Covid-19 from within the squad. 
• The Boks have had their preparations for the upcoming series against the British Lions severely disrupted. 
• Erasmus believes the outbreak in the Springbok squad might have come from exposure to the Georgian players during the first Test on 2 July. 

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Rassie Erasmus says there is nothing more the players, management or SA Rugby could have done to prevent the outbreak of Covid-19 within the Springbok camp. 

The Boks are now in Cape Town preparing for their three-Test series against the British & Irish Lions, starting on 24 July. 

It has been the most challenging of periods for Erasmus and his charges, with around 20 positive cases emerging in the last week from within the camp across players and staff. 

It resulted in this past Friday's scheduled Test match against Georgia being canceled, and Erasmus is now looking to Wednesday's clash between SA 'A' and the Lions to field a number of his first-choice Springboks to get them match fit ahead of the first Test. 

With the likes of captain Siya Kolisi, flyhalf Handre Pollard and head coach Jacques Nienaber all currently isolating having tested positive, a total of 34 players are together in Cape Town where the Boks have returned to fully negative sets of test results over the last two days.  

While the British Lions also had a Covid-19 scare within their camp ahead of Wednesday's clash against the Sharks in Johannesburg, the tourists have been largely in control of the situation since landing on South African shores. 

It has led to questions over the Springboks' safety protocols and whether or not their bio-bubble was breached somehow in recent weeks, or if there had been irresponsible behaviour from any players in potentially leaving the bubble, but in speaking to media on Monday Erasmus said he was confident that nobody from within the Bok set-up had broken any rules. 

He believes that the exposure might have come from his side's first Test against Georgia in Johannesburg on July 2, with the eastern Europeans later returning four positive Covid-19 Tests of their own after that match. 

"No, no," Erasmus said when asked if there was anything more that could have been done to limit the severity of the outbreak. 

"When it was just us in Bloemfontein [in camp] for three weeks, we didn't have a case.

"When we then got the guys in [camp] from all over the world [the overseas-based payers] ... then we had one positive case which was RG Snyman. He still had burn wounds and was going back to the specialist and moving out of our camp." "We didn't have any other positive case until we played Georgia and then, after that Test match, we got all the positive cases.

"I can promise you that after the Georgian Test match nobody left the hotel, and nobody was allowed to go out.

"From our side, I'm fairly confident that up until that Test match, we were doing really well.

"After that we had a few cases, but we've managed that now and we went into isolation, quarantined and we've got 34 fit players now.

"I'm really confident that none o the players or management were at fault for this."

Erasmus is looking to secure a second match between the SA 'A' side and the Lions on Saturday in a fixture that would see the Stormers lose out, claiming that it would be safer for all concerned to use the same players who are already in a bubble together. 

"The moment you bring teams from the outside in, it's a very tough situation to control," he said. 

Teams:

South Africa 'A'

15 Willie le Roux, 14 Cheslin Kolbe, 13 Lukhanyo Am (captain), 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Sbu Nkosi, 10 Morne Steyn, 9 Faf de Klerk, 8 Jasper Wiese, 7 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 6 Marco van Staden, 5 Franco Mostert, 4 Eben Etzebeth, 3 Trevor Nyakane, 2 Joseph Dweba, 1 Steven Kitshoff

Substitutes (from): 16 Malcolm Marx, 17 Coenie Oosthuizen, 18 Vincent Koch, 19 Nicolaas Janse van Rensburg, 20 Rynhardt Elstadt, 21 Herschel Jantjies, 22 Jesse Kriel, 23 Damian Willemse, 24 Kwagga Smith, 25 Elton Jantjies

British & Irish Lions

15 Anthony Watson (England), 14 Louis Rees-Zammit (Wales), 13 Chris Harris (Scotland), 12 Bundee Aki (Ireland), 11 Josh Adams (Wales), 10 Dan Biggar (Wales), 9 Conor Murray (captain, Ireland), 8 Taulupe Faletau (Wales), 7 Tom Curry (England), 6 Josh Navidi (Wales), 5 Iain Henderson (Ireland), 4 Maro Itoje (England), 3 Kyle Sinckler (England), 2 Ken Owens (Wales), 1 Wyn Jones (Wales)

Substitutes: 16 Luke Cowan-Dickie (England), 17 Mako Vunipola (England), 18 Zander Fagerson (Scotland), 19 Adam Beard (Wales), 20 Tadhg Beirne (Ireland), 21 Sam Simmonds (England), 22 Gareth Davies (Wales), 23 Elliot Daly (England)