De Villiers departed immediately to hospital for X-rays on the opposite side of his jaw to the first injury sustained in August, but head coach Heyneke Meyer announced his skipper was out on Sunday.
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South Africa captain Jean de Villiers is out of the World Cup after sustaining a fractured jaw in Saturday’s 46-6 win over Samoa.
Starting XV: Willie le Roux; JP Pietersen, Jesse Kriel, Damian de Allende, Bryan Habana; Handre Pollard, Fourie du Preez (captain); Tendai Mtawarira, Bismarck du Plessis, Jannie du Plessis; Eben Etzebeth, Lood de Jager; Francois Louw, Schalk Burger, Duane Vermeulen.
The experienced Du Preez, who provided excellent, clean quality ball for the backs at Villa Park, will lead out the team in a rather surprising move.
Bismarck du Plessis returns at hooker in place of Adriaan Strauss.
Meyer said his team would have to build on the victory over Samoa after losing to Japan in their opening game to stay on course for the quarter-finals.
“Jean is not only our captain and one of the most experienced players in the squad, but he is also the glue of this team and to lose him is very sad”, Meyer said. “He will know exactly what is needed on Saturday when we continue our fight to keep our World Cup dream alive”.
“Schalk (Burger) stood in on the last occasion that Jean and Victor were both absent earlier this season before Fourie had returned to fitness”.
Jan Serfontein, who flew from South Africa to replace De Villiers, goes straight onto the bench.
South Africa begun their World Cup campaign with a shock 34-32 defeat by Japan before their win over Samoa.
That focus on doing themselves justice and not worrying too much about their opponents is a constant theme of Springboks press conferences, but Meyer was happy to talk expansively about a Scotland team he is convinced will be more of a challenge than might have been the case in previous years.
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“We know in which areas we have to improve and we will have to fire at 100% on Saturday against a motivated Scotland side”.
