You have to withstand pain to beat Boks - Gatland

Wales coach Warren Gatland is under no illusions about the task his backs to the wall young squad face when they take on South Africa at Twickenham on Saturday in what for them is a warmup to a two test tour of Australia in July.

Gatland told the Welsh media after announcing a team that excludes several regulars who are either injured or unavailable due to the game falling outside of the international window that you have to lose your fear when facing the World Cup champions and current No 1 ranked team and be prepared to go through pain.

“Test match rugby is tough and physical. You have got to be able to handle adversity,” said the New Zealander.

“You have to go through that pain sometimes and be able to come out the other side. There is nothing wrong with that. You have to be brave and overcome your fear factor. You are going out there and playing against big men, and it is going to hurt and you have to go through some pain.”

Wales endured a disastrous Six Nations campaign earlier this year, failing to win a match, with their last big achievement being their comprehensive win over Australia in the pool phase of the World Cup in France last October that secured them a quarterfinal against Argentina that they lost.

The Welsh will draw some confidence from the fact that they beat the Boks, who fielded an experimental team, in the middle test of a three game series in South Africa two years ago. That narrow win in Bloemfontein was Wales’s first ever triumph on South African soil.

However that side, captained by Dan Biggar, was a very different side to the one that the Boks, who are part experimental and part a settled combination for the Twickenham game, will face on Saturday as part of a double header at the London venue. In the later game at Twickenham, Fiji play the Barbarians.

Wales, 10th in the world rankings, are without several England-based players including Nick Tompkins, Dafydd Jenkins and Tommy Reffell because the game falls outside World Rugby’s test window. And they sustained a body blow on the day of the team announcement when it was announced that Jac Morgan, a co-captain at the World Cup, had been withdrawn from the team for Saturday and the squad to tour Australia because of a hamstring injury picked up in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship quarterfinal.

They have experienced a lock crisis due to the unavailability of Jenkins, the Exeter Chiefs player who led Wales in the Six Nations. Adam Beard, a British and Irish Lion in South Africa in 2021, is injured, while Will Rowlands is being rested. Christ Tshiunza is unavailable for the same reason as his Exeter club mate, Jenkins.

Gatland though is eager for his young players to learn from playing the top team in the world.

“We have our backs to the wall a little bit this week, but we are really excited about the challenge,” said the Kiwi.

“I see it as a great opportunity for other players to step up and put their hands up.”