Massive blow for Springboks as Malcolm Marx ruled out of Rugby World Cup

South Africa Rugby have confirmed that Malcolm Marx suffered a serious injury in training and will miss the rest of the Rugby World Cup.

There were strong rumours on Wednesday evening that the hooker had torn his ACL earlier that day.

The Springboks duly confirmed on Thursday that Marx suffered a serious injury and has been ruled out of the global tournament.

They did not reveal the full extent of the injury, only stating that he suffered a “long-term knee injury” having “caught his knee in contact” during training.

Tragic end to Marx’s World Cup

“First and foremost, we are extremely disappointed for Malcolm, and we wish him all the best in his recovery,” head coach Jacques Nienaber said.

“He’s been working very hard to be in the best form possible for the tournament, and it’s tragic that his campaign has ended this way.

“As a team we will remain in contact with him, as we do with all injured players such as Lukhanyo (Am), Handre (Pollard) and Lood (de Jager), and support him as much as we can through the recovery process.

“We have enough cover at hooker with Bongi (Mbonambi) and Deon (Fourie) in the squad, while Marco (van Staden) has also been training there and has been named on all our team sheets so far as a hooker option.

“We’ll assess our needs for the rest of the tournament and confirm who we are calling up as an additional player later this week.”

No hooker replacement

Marx’s injury leaves the Boks with just Bongi Mbonambi and Deon Fourie as options at hooker, although as Nienaber intimated, Van Staden has been seen practising his lineout throwing in training.

As a result, they have stated that the 29-year-old will not be replaced by another hooker at this stage, which could open the door for South Africa to bring back one of the players that missed the initial 33-man squad due to injury.

Handre Pollard, Lukhanyo Am and Lood de Jager were all key parts of their 2019 World Cup triumph but missed out this time around.

However, Pollard has been training with club side Leicester Tigers and, with the Springboks short of fly-halves, he could be an option to bring in.

South Africa started their 2023 World Cup campaign with an 18-3 victory over Scotland and they will look to make it successive wins when they face Romania on Sunday.

READ MORE: Springboks include all four scrum-halves in squad for Rugby World Cup clash with Romania