Springboks wing ruled out of Rugby World Cup after suffering facial injury

South Africa director of rugby Rassie Erasmus has confirmed that Makazole Mapimpi will miss the remainder of the Rugby World Cup through injury.

The wing fractured both his eye socket and cheekbone after being tackled head-on-head by Tonga’s Augustine Pulu.

Referee Luke Pearce decided that it was only a penalty offence and did not upgrade it to a yellow card when it was reviewed by the television match official.

2019 heroics

Mapimpi was a star of the last tournament and scored the Springboks’ first-ever World Cup final try in the 32-12 victory over England.

The 33-year-old dropped down the pecking order ahead of the 2023 competition after being usurped by Kurt-Lee Arendse, but he has remained a vital part of the squad.

“We are sad for Mapimpi,” Erasmus said. “He fractured his eye socket and cheekbone, so he’ll be out for four to six weeks.

“We’ll miss him as a player and what he brings to the team off the field. But if we get to the final, we’ll fly him and Malcolm Marx back.”

South Africa go into the final weekend of the group stages in a good position, with them at the summit of Pool B, but they are relying on the Ireland v Scotland result going their way for qualification to be confirmed.

It would take a bizarre set of circumstances for the defending champions to be ousted, however, and Erasmus is content with where they stand.

“I’d much rather sit here than be Ireland, who are No 1 in the world, knowing that Scotland only have to beat them by eight points without a bonus point to go out,” he said.

“Of the three teams we are probably the most comfortable sitting here. That said, we could have two weeks before the quarter-final, or we could have a six-month break if things don’t go our way.

“On Saturday night we’ll know exactly who we will play. If we finish first, we’ll play the quarter-final on Saturday and if we are second, we’ll play on Sunday.”

Preparing for the quarter-finals

The Springboks are not waiting on the outcome of Ireland’s clash with Scotland and have already started preparing for their quarter-final opponents.

They could conceivably face either France, New Zealand or even Italy, so Erasmus and the coaches are gearing up for all eventualities.

“From our point of view, we did what we had to do to go through, and we now have time to prepare for the different possible scenarios. Some of us will prepare for the All Blacks, and others for France,” the director of rugby added.

“But France and Italy still have to play, so we’ll have guys preparing for Italy as well. Italy in particular are used to facing the northern hemisphere teams, so there are still interesting permutations in the competition.”

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