Faf de Klerk and his Springbok teammates in the Sale Sharks team are knie diep innie k@k.
Eight SA stars (De Klerk, Robert, Jean-Luc and Dan du Preez, Lood de Jager, Akker van der Merwe, Coenie Oosthuizen and Jono Ross) all decided not to take the knee in a gesture of support for the Black Lives Matter movement when the English Premiership resumed last weekend.
Wearing “Rugby against Racism” T-shirts ahead of their clash against Harlequins, the South Africans were among 11 of the 15 Sharks starters to remain standing – the others being
England centre Manu Tuilagi, Welshman WillGriff John and Scotland’s Byron McGuignon.
The lack of support for the global social justice movement did not go down well with sports minister Nathi Mthethwa, who asked SA Rugby to investigate.
Mthethwa was quoted as saying: “Upon seeing this‚ I interacted with SA Rugby through its president [Mark Alexander] and I asked him to explain what’s happening so that we are on the same wavelength.
“You must remember we were together at the World Cup in Japan as a country with some of the players and one thing which cannot be tolerated is when somebody is displaying racist behaviour and showing racist attitude.
“The president of Saru did say they are going to be having their own meeting and they will make their views known.”
Last month SA captain Siya Kolisi showed his support for the BLM movement in a video, while the Springboks’ Director of Rugby, Rassie Erasmus, stressed the importance of transformation in an inclusive Bok setup.