Walker was actually called up as an injury replacement for Leigh Halfpenny before the World Cup but then suffered a hamstring issue and was himself replaced by Ross Moriarty with less than a week to go until the competition.
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Wales’ Lloyd Williams has revealed how he and fellow scrum-half Gareth Davies have re-enacted the try that helped knock England out of the World Cup at the request of teammates.
Walker had initially been included in Warren Gatland’s 31-man squad before pulling out with a hamstring injury.
“The amount of players we have lost isn’t ideal”.
“In my experience, and the players’ experience, every time we have played against South Africa it has been a very physical, attritional, uncompromising game, and it is going to be no different on Saturday”.
“Beating England was a key victory for us just to reinforce our confidence”. Gethin Jenkins didn’t play on Saturday, but he’s been equally impressive in a position that’s extremely tough. We are a pretty small nation anyway, but we still had a pretty potent back-line out there on Saturday and I am sure it will be the same again next weekend.
Jamie Roberts has been predictable, in a sense – and while that sounds like a negative, it’s not.
“If you look at the South African strengths, it’s an aerial battle”.
Fly-half Dan Biggar says that Wales will take inspiration from their recent history against South Africa when they head into punishing World Cup knockout territory.
Wales triumphed 12-6 over South Africa in Cardiff a year ago and ran the Springboks close in a 31-30 defeat when the sides met in Nelspruit earlier in 2014. Arguably we should have won.
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Howley added: “Having looked at South Africa over the last four or five weeks, the Japan loss refocused where they were at”.
