Both 23s are in for Soweto. Rassie Erasmus made four changes and moved Cheslin Kolbe to fullback. Dave Rennie changed three forwards and dropped 110 caps. The series is 1-1, and the side that loses on Saturday cannot win it.
Whoever loses at FNB Stadium on Saturday cannot win Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry. That is the whole preview in one line, and both coaches have said it out loud this week.
The Springboks vs All Blacks third Test kicks off at 17:10 in Johannesburg on Saturday 5 September, 16:10 in the UK and Ireland. New Zealand won 33-16 at Ellis Park. South Africa won 33-26 in Cape Town while being outscored four tries to three.
One Test left in South Africa, one in Baltimore, and the maths is brutal. Win Saturday and Baltimore is for the series. Lose it and Baltimore is for a draw.
South Africa have played New Zealand twice at this ground and lost both, in 2010 and 2012. Nobody in the current squad was on the field for either. Which is exactly why the venue record is the least useful number on this page.
Call the score in the comments before you scroll. The site’s own call is further down, and it will annoy one set of fans.
Add a winning margin for points
What changed for South Africa
Four changes and a positional switch, and Erasmus has gone back to the front row he first picked a week ago before the Cape Town weather got a vote. Ox Nché, Malcolm Marx and Wilco Louw start. Gerhard Steenekamp, Deon Fourie and Thomas du Toit go to the bench.
The change he did not want to make is at the back. Damian Willemse took a knock in the first half at DHL Stadium and is out, Handré Pollard is out too, so Kolbe moves to 15 and Kurt-Lee Arendse returns on the right wing with 25 tries from 33 Tests.
Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu keeps the 10 jersey, and with Pollard and Willemse both gone the kicking game belongs to him, Kolbe and Manie Libbok off the bench. Kolbe kicked 18 points in Cape Town from the wing, and the tee will not be far from him on Saturday.
Same locks, same loose trio. Siya Kolisi, Pieter-Steph du Toit and Jasper Wiese start a 17th Test together, a Springboks record. The starting XV carries 958 caps.
What changed for New Zealand
Rennie’s three changes are all in the pack, and none of them is a prop. Codie Taylor is out of the 23 entirely after Cape Town, where New Zealand threw 18 lineouts and won 15. Asafo Aumua starts at hooker with Samisoni Taukei’aho behind him.
Sam Darry starts at lock and Fabian Holland drops to the bench. Peter Lakai starts at six in place of Simon Parker, and Wallace Sititi comes into the 23 for his first Test of the series.
The backline is untouched, from Cam Roigard and Ruben Love through to Damian McKenzie. Josh Moorby, unused in Cape Town, keeps the 23 jersey. Tupou Vaa’i wins his 50th cap.
Six hundred and six caps in the New Zealand XV. Three hundred and fifty-two fewer than the men opposite.
Read also: the number that decided the last one. South Africa got into the All Blacks 22 four times in Cape Town and that was enough. New Zealand got in nine times and lost.
The squads
South Africa
- Ox Nché
- Malcolm Marx
- Wilco Louw
- Eben Etzebeth
- Ruan Nortjé
- Siya Kolisi (captain)
- Pieter-Steph du Toit
- Jasper Wiese
- Cobus Reinach
- Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu
- Ethan Hooker
- Damian de Allende
- Jesse Kriel
- Kurt-Lee Arendse
- Cheslin Kolbe
Replacements: 16 Deon Fourie, 17 Gerhard Steenekamp, 18 Thomas du Toit, 19 Lood de Jager, 20 André Esterhuizen, 21 Cameron Hanekom, 22 Morné van den Berg, 23 Manie Libbok.
New Zealand
- George Bower
- Asafo Aumua
- Tyrel Lomax
- Tupou Vaa’i
- Sam Darry
- Peter Lakai
- Luke Jacobson
- Ardie Savea (captain)
- Cam Roigard
- Ruben Love
- Leroy Carter
- Jordie Barrett
- Quinn Tupaea
- Will Jordan
- Damian McKenzie
Replacements: 16 Samisoni Taukei’aho, 17 Xavier Numia, 18 Fletcher Newell, 19 Fabian Holland, 20 Wallace Sititi, 21 Kyle Preston, 22 Anton Lienert-Brown, 23 Josh Moorby.
Three battles that decide Saturday
Aumua’s throw against Etzebeth’s read. Rennie called the lineout “a work on” after Cape Town, and it was more than that. South Africa’s first two tries came off a driving maul, and Jason Ryan timed the maul defence at two seconds late. Now Rennie has a new thrower in a stadium where the call does not travel. Watch the first New Zealand lineout inside their own half. If Aumua goes to the front, the lineout has been told to survive rather than attack, and that tells you how much confidence the coaches have in it.
Nché’s second shove against Lomax. Rennie took the Springboks scrum to World Rugby and Erasmus called the complaint nonsense. Kieran Read says it is legal, and explained why a referee cannot see it. None of that changes what happens at the first scrum. Ignore the hit. The moment that matters is the second drive, once the engagement has settled and Nika Amashukeli has stopped looking for an early penalty. If Nché gets that away before the referee’s arm moves, South Africa have won the selection argument inside the first ten minutes.
Kolbe at 15 against the New Zealand chase. This is the one the tourists will have circled. Kolbe at fullback is not a weakness under the high ball, and half of New Zealand wanted Kolbe banned for his hit on Leroy Carter, so nobody in black needs reminding what he does in contact. But contestable kicks into the 15-metre channel drag a 1.71-metre fullback into a jump against Will Jordan, and every kick that does not force a knock-on gives Kolbe a start in broken field. That is a trade both sides will accept. One of them is wrong.
The last twenty, and who wins it this time
New Zealand emptied seven of eight replacements in Cape Town and lost the final quarter anyway. South Africa’s bench produced three Marx turnovers and eighteen points off Kolbe’s boot. And yet the pattern of this series is odd: the Bomb Squad has stopped winning the last quarter by the margins it used to, and Erasmus did not argue when it was put to him.
Rennie’s answer is two ball-carriers where there was one. Lakai starts, Sititi covers. Tamati Ellison put the number on it at training on Tuesday: New Zealand beat 40 Springboks tackles at DHL Stadium and still lost, and the plan is to “double down on that this week.”
The risk is the other way. Jordie Barrett said this week that he is physically sore, two Tests into a series against the one opponent that makes every collision expensive, and his cover is the same 92-cap centre and three-cap wing who covered him last week.
There is a specific tiredness at 65 minutes at altitude where the legs still work and the decisions do not. On television it looks like a midfielder standing in the line with his hands on his hips instead of folding round the ruck. That is the moment the last twenty is decided, and it is the moment a bench earns its place in the 23.
The variables: altitude, a dry ball, and a referee who stands over the ruck
FNB Stadium sits around 1,750 metres up. New Zealand won at that altitude a fortnight ago, so the tired-legs theory cuts both ways.
The forecast for Saturday is a high of 21°C dropping to 9°C after dark, a light wind and around a millimetre of rain, after a wet Friday. Dry ball, cool air, hard ground. That favours the side that wants to run, and Ellison has already said which side that is.
The referee is Nika Amashukeli, who was due to take Cape Town before illness produced the referee swap that gave Angus Gardner Cape Town instead, confirmed in World Rugby’s revised appointments. Amashukeli positions himself over the breakdown and rewards a legal jackal quickly. That suits Lakai’s hands, and it suits Marx’s.
Then there is the noise. Erasmus said it plainly in his announcement: “With the vuvuzelas and passionate crowd there, we can hardly hear one another on the field.” A lineout call that does not travel is a problem for the team with the new hooker, not the team with the record cap-holder at lock.
The call
South Africa 27, New Zealand 23.
The reasoning is in the three battles above. New Zealand will make more line breaks, as they have in both Tests. But a first-choice Springboks front row at altitude, a maul New Zealand have not yet defended on time, and a kicker who put 18 points over in Cape Town add up to a side that does not need line breaks.
If Aumua’s lineout holds through the first half, tear this up, because the Test flips.
Springboks vs All Blacks third Test kick-off times
| Country | Local time |
|---|---|
| South Africa | 17:10, Saturday 5 September |
| UK and Ireland | 16:10, Saturday |
| France | 17:10, Saturday |
| Australia (AEST) | 01:10, Sunday |
| New Zealand | 03:10, Sunday |
| USA (Eastern) | 11:10am, Saturday |
Live on SuperSport in South Africa, Sky Sport in New Zealand and Sky Sports in the UK and Ireland, with the official fixture details on SA Rugby’s match centre. The Springboks Women play the Black Ferns at the same ground at 13:30, the first meeting between the two on South African soil.
Read next: how to beat the Springboks: you don’t break them, you make them kick, the plan New Zealand got half right in Cape Town. For the New Zealand side of the week, Stephen Donald rates two wins in South Africa above a World Cup. And for the full run of dates and results, every fixture, result and kick-off time in Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry.
Frequently asked
What time does the Springboks vs All Blacks third Test kick off?
Kick-off is 17:10 South African time on Saturday 5 September at FNB Stadium, Johannesburg. That is 16:10 in the UK and Ireland, 17:10 in France, 01:10 on Sunday morning in eastern Australia and 03:10 on Sunday morning in New Zealand.
Who referees the third Test at FNB Stadium?
Nika Amashukeli. He was originally appointed to the Cape Town Test but did not recover from illness in time, so he and Angus Gardner swapped matches. Gardner refereed Cape Town and Amashukeli takes Johannesburg.
What happens to the series if South Africa win?
South Africa would lead 2-1 with the fourth Test in Baltimore on Saturday 12 September to play. New Zealand could then only draw the series, not win it. The same applies in reverse: an All Blacks win on Saturday means the Springboks can do no better than 2-2.
Have the Springboks ever beaten the All Blacks at FNB Stadium?
No. The teams have met twice at the ground, in 2010 and 2012, and New Zealand won both. South Africa have won six of the last eight meetings overall since August 2023, so the venue record and the recent record point in opposite directions.
Your turn
The call above is South Africa by four. Screenshot it. If Aumua throws fifteen from fifteen and New Zealand win the last twenty for the first time in this series, the comments are open on Saturday night and the scoreline deserves whatever it gets.
