Who’s hot and who’s not: Ellis Genge and World Cup Sevens winners shine, bad week for Worcester Warriors and Elton Jantjies

Adam Kyriacou
Ellis Genge and Elton Jantjies split

It’s time for our Monday wrap of who has their name in lights and who is making the headlines for all the wrong reasons after the weekend.

THEY’RE ON FIRE

Ellis Genge’s Bristol Bears debut: He was close to tears in a post-match interview which shows just how much this return home means to Genge. It showed on the field too as he scored two tries in Bristol’s victory over local rivals Bath as the Bears got their season off to a good start. Genge’s first score was outstanding as he raced over from 50 metres before his second saw him waltz in past some rather dismal Bath defending. It’s clear, if it wasn’t already, that Bristol will get the best out of Genge and the prop will take the Bears up another level this season.

Much better from physical Exeter: To beat the reigning champions, albeit an understrength visiting team, will delight Rob Baxter and Ali Hepher, especially after such a disappointing season in 2021/22. Let’s not take anything away from the result though as Exeter were also missing some key players but, as boss Hepher said after the game, last year they would have lost a match like this, so this is a step in the right direction. Exeter’s physicality was clear to see against the Tigers and if they can make Sandy Park a fortress, a bounce back campaign is on.

Rugby pays tribute to Her Majesty The Queen: All six Premiership fixtures this past weekend paid heartfelt tributes to The Queen, who sadly passed away on Thursday. A minute’s silence was followed by the national anthem as the sport paid its respects at the venues. Check out our Sunday Social piece at the bottom of this feature to see how rugby union paid its respects since Thursday’s upsetting news.

Sell-out crowd for Munster v South Africa Select XV fixture: Was there ever any doubt? On Friday, Munster announced they had sold-out the Pairc Ui Chaoimh for their meeting with a South Africa Select XV on November 10. Memories of the Munster v Maori All Blacks clash of 2016 will still be fresh in the memories of Munster supporters and they and the squad will see this as an opportunity to add another piece of history to the Munster story. For South Africa’s fringe players it’s their chance to shine with a Rugby World Cup around the corner. Put those ingredients together in front of a sold-out crowd and we should have quite a game in prospect. Bring on that Thursday evening.

Rugby World Cup Sevens winners: Congratulations to Australia and Fiji after they claimed the Women’s and Men’s Gold Medals at the Rugby World Cup Sevens in Cape Town on Sunday. Australia overcame New Zealand 24-22 in a thrilling final while Fiji got the better of New Zealand 29-12 in the Men’s. These medals will take pride of place in the players’ households and rightly so as these memories will live on for a long time. A mention must also go to Ireland’s Men’s team, who picked up the Bronze Medal to cap and outstanding weekend for the team.

COLD AS ICE

Elton Jantjies sent home by Boks: Shocking news circulated around the Springboks on Sunday after Jantjies and team dietician Zeenat Simjee were sent home from Argentina. The country’s Sunday newspapers have alleged the pair were having an affair and that there has also been an incident involving them at a Mbombela hotel. SA Rugby’s statement said that although no team protocols were breached at the hotel around the New Zealand game on August 6, the duo would travel home. If nothing else, this is an unwelcome distraction for the Springboks.

Worcester’s pain continues: Unfortunately for Warriors fans there was to be no fairy-tale start to the Premiership season as they were comprehensively beaten by London Irish on Saturday. With the club’s future still very much in the air – despite news of a potential investor being interested – it was clear that a lack of warm-up games hurt Worcester in Brentford as they were brushed aside by the Exiles in a 45-14 loss that compounds their woes right now. However, expect Sixways to be packed to the rafters and full of emotion on Sunday for their first home game of the season, against Exeter. Steve Diamond and his players will look to harness said emotion in what’s a huge day for the club.

Blitzboks bow out at home: It’s always a hugely expectant crowd in Cape Town when their beloved Blitzboks feature in a home event, so their Cup quarter-final exit at the hands of Ireland was a hammer blow to both players and supporters. In Neil Powell’s last tournament as head coach, South Africa were looking to give him the perfect send-off but that wasn’t to be as they were well beaten 24-14 by the Irish, who went on to take the Bronze Medal. Basic errors were highlighted by Powell in the immediate aftermath of that loss as his tenure ends with a disappointing tournament showing, as they also went down to Argentina on Day Three before restoring some pride with a win over Samoa.

Bad day for Freddie Burns: The hero of the Premiership final not too long ago had a day to forget for Leicester in their season opener on Saturday. Burns was yellow carded on 18 minutes for deliberately knocking the ball dead in-goal, which resulted in him being yellow carded and a penalty try being given to Exeter. We often see players who have recently made the switch from rugby league make the error, which we can forgive as it is the norm in that code, but for Burns he will know himself there is no excuse and the punishment was not worth the risk.

Sad passing of Willie Los’e: One of the great rugby commentators sadly passed away in Cape Town last week as the sport was rocked by the news. The former Tonga international lock forward was loved the world over by those who played and worked alongside him. The 55-year-old was in South Africa preparing to cover the Rugby World Cup Sevens and is a huge loss to those close to him and also rugby union. Our thoughts are with his family and friends as both Sevens and XVs will be a poorer place without his coverage. This was a lovely tribute to the man.

Debut to forget for Niall Annett: After making the switch to Bath from Worcester Warriors in the off-season, Annett was hoping to get on and impress for his new side against Bristol Bears on Saturday. Unfortunately that was made impossible after he got involved in the first-half scuffle between both sets of teams. Warming up wearing a bib with the rest of the Bath replacements, he joined in the ruckus after Luke Morahan’s score in the corner and was subsequently shown a red card by referee Matthew Carley. A day to forget for Annett, who has since posted a tweet apologising for his behaviour. He’ll hope to bounce back soon.

READ MORE: Sunday Social: Rugby pays tribute to Queen Elizabeth II