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Two teams who will be playing at RWC 2019 will meet in Montevideo on Sunday in the form of Uruguay and Namibia. They are to play their second of three matches in the Nations Cup. In their prior matches Uruguay were 48-36 winners over Russia, while Namibia fell to a 39-25 defeat against the Argentina XV.
Uruguay go into the match against Namibia with six changes. They are split 3-3 between the forwards, and the backs. In the forwards the first alteration sees the most capped player in Uruguayan history, Diego Magno named to start in place of Gonzalo Soto.
At flanker Juan Ormaechea takes over from Santiago Civetta while the final change to the pack sees N8 Alejandro Nieto taking over from Manuel Diana.
In the backs the outstanding Santiago Arata is back in the team. He takes over from third choice scrum-half Tomás Inciarte who has been a revelation in the position in the Sudamérica 6 Naciones A as well as against Russia.
Rather than being dropped Inciarte has moved from scrum-half to outside center. He takes over from Nicolás Freitas who also changes position with him named to start on the left wing in place of Rodrigo Silva.
Namibia performed very well against the Argentina XV and have retained more players from that match than Uruguay have from theirs against Russia. The four changes made from Namibia also see an even split with two changes coming in the forwards, and two in the backs.
Up front Andre Rademeyer has been named to start at loose head prop in place of Desiderius Sethie. The remaining alteration to the back comes at flanker with Wian Conradie named to start in place of Thomasau Forbes.
In the backs Damian Stevens starts ahead of veteran Eugene Jantjies at scrum-half. Stevens has 23 caps compared to Jantjies who has 65 caps. The final change comes at fullback where Helarius Kisting will have an opportunity ahead of regular Johan Tromp.
Sunday’s test match will be the 4th ever between Uruguay, and Namibia. The first fixture took place in Montevideo in 2000 with Los Teros winning 23-12. Game’s two and three were played much later with Uruguay touring Namibia in November 2017. The South Americans won the series 2-0 winning the test matches 52-36, and 39-34.
Not only home advantage but also both history, and form are on Uruguay’s side. Combined they give Los Teros the favorites tag to win the match by 10 points.
TEAMS
Uruguay
1 Mateo Sanguinetti, 2 German Kessler, 3 Juan Pedro Rombys, 4 Diego Magno, 5 Manuel Leindekar, 6 Juan Manuel Gaminara (capt.), 7 Juan Ormaechea, 8 Alejandro Nieto, 9 Santiago Arata, 10 Juan Manuel Cat, 11 Nicolás Freitas, 12 Andrés Vilaseca, 13 Tomás Inciarte, 14 Federico Favaro, 15 Felipe Etcheverry
Replacements: 16 Guillermo Pujadas, 17 Facundo Gattas, 18 Juan Echeverria, 19 Ignacio Dotti, 20 Santiago Civetta, 21 Agustin Ormaechea, 22 Juan Pablo Constabile, 23 Manuel Ardao
NAMIBIA
1 Andre Rademeyer, 2 Obert Nortje, 3 Johan Coetzee, 4 AJ Retief, 5 Tjiuee Uanivi, 6 Wian Conradie, 7 Muharua Katjijeko, 8 Janco Venter, 9 Damian Stevens, 10 Cliven Loubser, 11 Oderich Mouton, 12 Darryl De La Harpe, 13 Johan Deysel (capt.), 14 JC Greyling, 15 Helarius Kisting
Replacements: 16 Niel Van Vuuren, 17 AJ De Klerk, 18 Desiderius Sethie, 19 Thomasau Forbes, 20 Jan Booysen, 21 Eugene Jantjies, 22 Justin Newman, 23 Gino Hartung
Date: Sunday, June 08
Kick-Off: 4:30pm
Venue: Estadio Charrúa, Montevideo
Referee: Ben Whitehouse (Wales)
Assistant Referees: Frank Murphy (Ireland), Santiago Romero (Uruguay)
