John Kirwan has led calls from New Zealand to crown the Springboks as heavy favourites for the upcoming two-Test mini-series with the All Blacks.
The Springboks have been boosted by the return to fitness of World Cup winners Steven Kitshoff, Canan Moodie and Jordan Hendrikse.
At the same time, Jasper Wiese and Andre Esterhuizen have completed bans to be included in the 37-man squad for the Rugby Championship clashes.
Rassie Erasmus has opted to increase the squad from 33 players to 37 for the two sold out Tests against their archrivals, at Emirates Airline Park in Johannesburg (31 August) and the DHL Stadium in Cape Town a week later (7 September).
The Boks go into the mini-series on the back of a historically successful tour of Australia, where they collected back-to-back bonus point wins in Brisbane and Perth.
The All Blacks, meanwhile, started their Rugby Championship with a shock loss to Argentina in Wellington, but bounced back with a stylish bonus-point victory in Auckland.
Following their win when the two teams last met at the World Cup final in Paris, the Boks are looking at claiming three wins in a row over the All Blacks for just the second time in the professional era, matching the record set in 2009.
Speaking on the latest episode of The Breakdown, Kirwan dismissed talk that the Boks fielded a B-team in Perth and said the two-time defending world champions should be considered favourites against the All Blacks.
“Rassie put that out through the media that it was the B-side. We know that they’ve just got 33 international players at the moment,” Kirwan said.
“We used to have that, in our golden era when we won two in a row. We had a side where anybody could have played. We’re rebuilding.
“For me, these guys are world champions. They go in as incredibly strong favourites. Welcome to my South African friends, you are favourites in a couple of weeks. So all the pressure is on you.”
The general New Zealand public echoes this feeling. In a poll run by Stuff.co.nz, over 60% of fans voted in favour of the Springboks being too strong for the All Blacks.
Photo: David Rogers/Getty Images
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