Springbok stars ready to rumble for Lions against Ospreys

Back from their tour with the Boks, Morné van den Berg and Quan Horn could be thrown straight into franchise action this weekend. The Lions are likely to throw their Springbok stars straight back into action when they take on Ospreys in their second United Rugby Championship (URC) match of the season at Ellis Park on Saturday afternoon. Scrumhalf Morné van den Berg and fullback Quan Horn have been with the Boks over the whole international season so far, although both haven’t played too much. Van den Berg has made four sub appearances and one start, while Horn started the non-Test against the Barbarians and has made two sub appearances, of the Boks’ 10 games so far this year. Both, however, featured for the Boks off the bench against the Wallabies in Australia last weekend, and despite having to fly back, assistant coach Jaque Fourie said they were both available for this weekend’s match. “Our Boks are available. The nice thing about Morne and Quan is that they are Lions men, they always want to play and they want the union to do well. So they are back in the squad and we just have to decide where we want to use them,” explained Fourie. Tricky challenge After starting their season on a good note with a hard-fought win over URC defending champs Leinster last week, the Lions now want to pick up another good win at home, especially with a tough run of away fixtures to follow. But they face a tricky challenge against a competitive Ospreys team, that they have a record of three wins, three losses and a draw against over the last five years, and Fourie highlighted that challenge, especially with the visitors smarting from a 41-24 defeat to the Sharks last weekend. “Even with them coming to Johannesburg, Ospreys are always a tough side. No matter where we play them it is always a tight match. They have a big pack of forwards and they maul a lot and scrum well,” said Fourie. “We saw in their game against the Sharks they scrummed really well, so they have brought that aspect to their game. “They also never go away. They play for 80 minutes, so we need to be clinical, we need to play in the right areas of the field and we need to put them under pressure with and without ball in hand.” A win over Ospreys is, however, almost non-negotiable for the Lions, as they follow this game up with an away clash against the Bulls at Loftus, before setting off overseas on a three-match tour, one in the Champions Cup against La Rochelle in France, and two in the URC against Glasgow Warriors and Edinburgh in Scotland. On Wednesday, the Lions also announced that star flyhalf Chris Smith, who joined them before the start of last season and played a major role in helping them reaching the URC knockouts, has signed a contract extension to stay at the union until 2029.