JC Pretorius still integrating into 15s, Blitzboks availability up in the air

Former Blitzboks star JC Pretorius has found the going tough since switching his allegiances from Sevens to the 15s game towards the end of last year.

Pretorius was snapped up by the Lions in December and although he has already played a couple of games for them, he has not been able to make an immediate impact.

With the Currie Cup now having kicked off it could be the perfect platform for Pretorius to get used to playing 15s again and build himself back up to being available for the Lions’ URC team, although Lions Currie Cup coach Mziwakhe Nkosi admitted that he wasn’t fully ready to play yet.

Front row to loose forward

“JC Pretorius is not available. He is in the last stage of his reintegration into 15s. It has been quite a change for him to go from Sevens into 15s. We have probably been guilty of blooding him too early,” said Nkosi ahead of the Lions’ first game which they lost to Western Province.

“So to be fair to him and to give him a fair shot, we have taken a decision to give him a good reintegration into 15s and that’s going really well. We have just come from an appraisal on how he has been reintegrating.

“Being a front row in Sevens and being a loose forward in 15s, there is a significant difference between the two.”

With the recent struggles of the Blitzboks in their Sevens series tour of North America where they were comprehensively outplayed by teams they usually wouldn’t break a sweat in beating, there have been calls for players such as Pretorius and Rosko Specman (Griquas) to be made available for the team.

Request to join Blitzboks

However, Nkosi claimed that was still a decision that had to be made by the Lions coaching group and they would do what is best for the player (Pretorius) going forward.

“That it is up for consideration. But we have to be aware of what is best for his interests. That decision will probably be taken soon,” said Nkosi.

“I haven’t officially seen that there has been another request. I know there was a request for Canada, but he had just made the transition to 15s, so that was a bit difficult. We had put him in a couple of hit outs just to see where he is at.

“So that made it difficult for him to join them in Canada. I heard Sandile Ngcobo speak about a request that was made from SA Rugby. But officially I haven’t seen it and I haven’t discussed it with Ivan (van Rooyen) or Rudolf (Straeuli). So if it is official we will obviously consider and discuss it.

“They are a national team and we will look to help them out. But for JC himself, the last 15s game he played was against the Lions U21, and he hasn’t played Sevens in a long time. So he hasn’t had the fortune of guys like Seabelo Senatla and Rosko Specman who bounced between the two.”