{"id":809935,"date":"2026-10-22T03:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-22T03:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/809935\/"},"modified":"2026-10-22T03:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-22T03:32:11","slug":"hyron-andrews-south-african-rugby-player-died-of-natural-causes-team-statement-says-rugby-union-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/809935\/","title":{"rendered":"Hyron Andrews: South African rugby player died of natural causes, team statement says | Rugby Union News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>An autopsy has found South African rugby player Hyron Andrews died from natural causes associated with his heart, a statement issued by his team the Lions on behalf of his family said Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>The statement, citing French authorities who conducted the autopsy, said Andrews&#8217; death last week at the age of 31 ahead of a game in France was found to be caused by &#8220;a tear in the aorta (due to natural causes)&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The aorta is the main artery leading away from the heart.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Andrews family asks for respect, privacy and patience during this difficult time as the repatriation process begins,&#8221; the statement added.<\/p>\n<p>        Twitter<\/p>\n<p>                This content is provided by Twitter, which may be using cookies and other technologies.<br \/>\n                To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies.<br \/>\n                You can use the buttons below to amend your preferences to enable Twitter cookies or to allow those cookies just once.<br \/>\n                You can change your settings at any time via the <a href=\"#privacy-options\">Privacy Options<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>                Unfortunately we have been unable to verify if you have consented to Twitter cookies.<br \/>\n                To view this content you can use the button below to allow Twitter cookies for this session only.<\/p>\n<p>                    <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-permanently\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"twitter\" data-show-on-fallback=\"false\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow\">Enable Cookies<\/a><br \/>\n                <a href=\"#\" class=\"ui-consent-roadblock-body__link ui-consent-roadblock-once\" data-single-click-vendor-name=\"twitter\" data-testid=\"consent-roadblock-allow-once\">Allow Cookies Once<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;A timeline for the return of Hyron&#8217;s body to South Africa has not yet been determined.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Andrews played as a lock for the Johannesburg-based Lions and was found dead at the team&#8217;s hotel in France last week ahead of a Champions Cup against La Rochelle, a French prosecutor told The Associated Press at the time.<\/p>\n<p>A statement at the time of his death from SA rugby said that Andrews &#8220;passed away tragically, following an accident&#8221; and that he had &#8220;died after falling&#8221; at the team hotel.<\/p>\n<p>Andrews&#8217; jersey was placed on the field as tribute was paid to him ahead of the game, with several Lions players in tears.<\/p>\n<p>The 31-year-old South African second-row forward had spent the previous two years of his career playing for Sale Sharks in England before returning home this summer to join the Lions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An autopsy has found South African rugby player Hyron Andrews died from natural causes associated with his heart,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":809936,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-809935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809935","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=809935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/809936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=809935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=809935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=809935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}