The man who has filled the flyhalf role for most of the Stormers games this season went to see a specialist on Monday. There had been no feedback on his ankle injury at the time that Fleck addressed the Cape media in a press conference at the High Performance Centre in Bellville, but Fleck wasn’t holding out any hope of Du Plessis being available for selection.
“Jean-Luc went for a scan today and he saw a specialist. We are waiting for feedback but he will certainly be out this weekend,” said Fleck.
“We have two flyhalves to choose from in Brandon Thomson and Robert du Preez and we will make a decision on which one will start over the next 24 hours.”
Why Fleck was feeling so upbeat at the start of the most important week of his team’s season was because all the other players who have been out injured recently reported fit for training on Monday.
“As far as injuries are concerned, Oli Kellbe, Dan du Plessis, Frans Malherbe and Nizaam Carr are all available for selection this week,” said the coach.
“That means there is competition for places and obviously we have some tough decisions to make. But that is a good position for us to be in ahead of a play-off game and is a better place to be than we have been before some of our play-off games in recent seasons where we’ve had a lot of injuries. Most of the players have shown good form over the past few weeks so there will be some close selection calls.
“Our only major concern at the moment is the amount of game time that the two flyhalves who will have to step into the breach have played recently. Other than that I’d say we are in a good space.”
The Stormers avoided the headache that Sharks coach Gary Gold has had to deal with in the past few days courtesy of the eligibility rulings.
Although a number of players haven’t been part of the stipulated four games that are needed to qualify to play in the knock-out phase of the competition, that rule only applies to players who weren’t named in the initial squad at the start of the season.
