{"id":585351,"date":"2026-05-15T11:14:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T11:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/585351\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T11:14:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T11:14:10","slug":"springboks-prop-runs-the-rule-over-englands-improving-front-row","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/585351\/","title":{"rendered":"Springboks prop runs the rule over England’s improving front-row"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Barbarians<\/a><\/p>\n

Springboks star Thomas du Toit has been impressed by the emerging front-row talent in England and expects a couple of youngsters to make it to the very top.<\/p>\n

South Africa has become the home of scrummaging with the Republic producing a lengthy list of outstanding props.<\/p>\n

Du Toit is one of those front-rowers having become one of the best forwards in the world over the past 12 months, establishing himself in the Boks XV.<\/p>\n

In contrast, England<\/a> have been struggling to produce scrummaging talent, but that looks like it is changing.<\/p>\n

England\u2019s young tighthead options<\/p>\n

The age-grade side won the World Rugby U20 Championship in 2024 thanks to its dominant set-piece, which contained Asher Opoku-Fordjour, Afolabi Fasogbon and Vilikesa Sela.<\/p>\n

Opoku-Fordjour has already earned Test caps while Bath\u2019s<\/a> Sela was involved in the Six Nations squad but did not feature in any of the games.<\/p>\n

As for Gloucester\u2019s rising star Fasogbon, he was the first one namechecked by Du Toit after putting together a series of excellent displays for the Cherry and Whites recently.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfo is doing unbelievably well and purely based on a consistency basis, he\u2019s playing week in, week out. He\u2019s putting in some serious minutes,\u201d he told The Good, The Bad and The Rugby podcast.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat guy will play 250, 300 games for Gloucester if he decides to stay and if his body keeps up, which it definitely looks like it\u2019s going to.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very biased, I think Billy Sela is amazing. He\u2019s everything that I would love to see in a younger player; unbelievable work-rate, he\u2019s got all the talent in the world and he\u2019s such a nice guy. A great guy to be around and a team man.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018You see stars after scrummaging against Ox Nche\u2019 \u2013 Springboks powerhouse claims South Africa training more difficult that Tests<\/a><\/p>\n

Fasogbon has also had a taste of the international set-up having toured with England during their mid-year series in 2025 but, like Sela, he did not feature.<\/p>\n

There has been some criticism of Steve Borthwick that neither have so far been given an opportunity at Test level, but Du Toit states that it is difficult to find the right balance when developing tightheads.<\/p>\n

Young tightheads \u2018don\u2019t shoot the lights out\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what I understand, a couple of the guys have been in camp, which was blooding enough for them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would have been great to see a couple of the guys play but I find it very difficult because if you think about it in a practical way, do you start them or do you bench them?<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re a starter who you believe will play 60-odd minutes and he goes off in the first 10, you throw in a youngster into the very deep end and if he doesn\u2019t perform well, you\u2019ve got this perception about him that\u2019s completely skewed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would always advocate for these guys starting. If it doesn\u2019t go well for 20 minutes, you go, \u2018listen, come off we\u2019ve got someone on the bench who has done it before, he will go and finish the job for us\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would have loved to have seen Billy play but he is so young and he is going to be phenomenal in the future, the way that he\u2019s tracking.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately, the thing with tightheads is you don\u2019t shoot the lights out in the beginning of your career, you just don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

Currently, Will Stuart, when fit, and Joe Heyes are the first choice England tightheads and Du Toit<\/a> knows the former well having played with him at Bath for the past three years.<\/p>\n

Despite the youngsters coming through and the impressive development of Heyes as a Test prop, the South African still believes Stuart will be Borthwick\u2019s go-to prop.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he\u2019s England\u2019s best tighthead, he\u2019s an incredible player. He\u2019s a very quiet man on the pitch, you won\u2019t here him talk a lot \u2013 maybe because he\u2019s tired \u2013 but he definitely delivers.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s on the brink of being for the next four or five years the best tighthead in England, he\u2019s got unbelievable ability.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Springboks prop set to miss the Rugby World Cup after doping suspension handed down<\/a><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Springboks star Thomas du Toit has been impressed by the emerging front-row talent in England and expects a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":585352,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[79322,309,348,3482,50,5903,101,80380,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-585351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-bath","tag-england","tag-home-page","tag-internationals","tag-news","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-thomas-du-toit","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=585351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/585352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=585351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=585351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=585351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}