Allister on the team selection for Friday

It’s a long competition and we will manage our athletes accordingly. Jaque Fourie plays off the bench with Paul Bosch falling out of the 22. Juan deserves another start and will wear the 13 jersey. It is great to have the luxury of replacing injured players with starting Boks!

In the other change to the backline, Dewaldt will wear the 9 jersey this week. We have 2 good scrummies, but Dewaldt deserves a start this week after some solid performances from the bench.

The rest of the starting line up remains the same.

On the bench we have bracketed Frans Malherbe with JC. Frans has a bit of flu and we will make a call on him after the captains’ practice on Thursday.

The team is as follows:

Gio Aplon, Danie Poolman, Juan de Jongh, Jean de Villiers (captain), Bryan Habana, Peter Grant, Dewaldt Duvenage, Duane Vermeulen, Francois Louw, Pieter Louw, Andries Bekker, Rynhardt Estadt, Brok Harris, Deon Fourie, CJ van der Linde.

Reserves: Siyabonga Ntubeni, Frans Malherbe/JC Kritzinger, De Kock Steenkamp, Ricky Januarie, Gary van Aswegen, Jaque Fourie.

DHL Stormers v Highlanders at DHL Newlands on Friday 11 March. Kick off is at 19h10.

Gates open at 16h30, and fans are encouraged to make their way to the stadium early as they can expect music, entertainment, face painters and much more on the Castle lawns.

In a curtain raiser to the main game, DHL WP will take on Namibia in a Vodacom Cup clash at 16h45.