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Rugby Union

Boks kept waiting for coach

03/12/2007

South Africa will find out Jake White's successor as national team coach on January 9th after a timeline for the appointment was revealed.

Four candidates have been short-listed to take charge of the newly crowned world champion Springboks after White, upset at being asked to reapply for his job in the middle of his campaign in France, decided to step down from his post.

The South African Rugby Union's appointment committee will interview Allister Coetzee, Peter de Villiers, Heyneke Meyer and Chester Williams in the two days preceding the announcement.

Originally the schedule for appointing a new coach had included a round of interviews before Christmas.

"It makes much more sense that we do it this way, rather than interview the candidates now and then wait for more than a month for the President's Council to decide on the matter," Johan Prinsloo, chief executive of the SARU, said.

No clear favourite has yet emerged from the quartet, but it is thought that the Meyer's Super 14 victory with the Blue Bulls may be outweighed by the other candidates' previous experience with the national side and a desire to have a more representative coaching structure as well as playing staff.