The Albany Gazette - Tandy makes wholesale Wales changes for Springboks

The Saturday fixture falls out of the international Test window, meaning Tandy has seen a raft of first-choice players returning to their clubs.

Lock Adam Beard is based in France with Montpellier, while there are 12 players who ply their trade in England.

Rhys Carre, Olly Cracknell, Jarrod Evans, Archie Griffin, Louie Hennessey, Dafydd Jenkins, Max Llewellyn, Louis Rees-Zammit, Nicky Smith, Freddie Thomas, Nick Tompkins and Tomos Williams are all unavailable.

Aaron Wainwright returns for Wales at No 8 having recovered from the injury that kept him out of Wales' 52-26 defeat by New Zealand last weekend.

Taine Plumtree is named at blindside flanker and Alex Mann is at openside, while Ben Carter and Rhys Davies pair up in the second row for their first appearances for Wales this autumn.

Dewi Lake skippers the side from hooker, alongside Gareth Thomas and Keiron Assiratti in the front row.

Kieran Hardy and Dan Edwards are at half-back, with Joe Roberts partnering Joe Hawkins in midfield.

Blair Murray continues at full back with Rio Dyer and Ellis Mee, who joined the Wales squad on Monday, selected on the wings.

Among the replacements, loosehead prop Danny Southworth is in line to make his Test debut with an appearance from the bench.

Brodie Coghlan, Christian Coleman, James Ratti and Morgan Morse are the forward cover, with Reuben Morgan-Williams, Callum Sheedy and Ben Thomas selected as backline replacements.

"What we want to see from the boys is the same type of effort and performance as we did last weekend," Tandy said.

"I think we showed a lot of attacking intent, a lot of toughness in the way we went about lots of the defensive effort as well, to give the supporters something to shout about."

Tandy added: "We're going into the last game, which we're all excited about. The players love the fact of playing at Principality Stadium in front of the best support in the world."

Wales kicked off their Autumn Nations Series campaign with a 52-28 mauling by Argentina before scraping a 24-23 victory over Japan. They then ran in four tries against the All Blacks before the second-ranked team in the world pulled away.

Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus will also be limited in his selection with a host of players heading back to their South African, English, French and Japanese clubs.

Erasmus, known for having developed incredible strength in depth in the Boks, will be without newly-crowned world player of the year Malcolm Marx, Thomas du Toit, Boan Venter, Lood de Jager, RG Snyman, Pieter-Steph du Toit, Grant Williams, Handre Pollard, Manie Libbok, Jesse Kriel, Cheslin Kolbe and Edwill van der Merwe.

Wales (15-1)

Blair Murray; Ellis Mee, Joe Roberts, Joe Hawkins, Rio Dyer; Dan Edwards, Kieran Hardy; Aaron Wainwright, Alex Mann, Taine Plumtree; Rhys Davies, Ben Carter; Keiron Assiratti, Dewi Lake (capt), Gareth Thomas

Replacements: Brodie Coghlan, Danny Southworth, Christian Coleman, James Ratti, Morgan Morse, Reuben Morgan-Williams, Callum Sheedy, Ben Thomas

Coach: Steve Tandy (WAL)

(W.Walker--TAG)