Monday, 1st October 2007 at 3:58 pm

Schalk Burger starts life at number eight

If you’re looking for World Cup omens - and there’s a healthy dose of superstition in the air whenever a major sport event comes around - then casting back to 1995 provides just the ticket. Remember Mark Andrews at number eight?

“The coach asked me if I could play at eight, and I told him I could,” Andrews told Feverpitcher with a broad grin; “I’d never played there before, though, so later that evening I had to go and tell him that I actually didn’t have a clue what to do at number eight.” Kitsch Christie kept faith in his maverick switch, and so Andrews, usually resident in the second row, found himself at the back of the scrum, from where he went on to win a World Cup.

Fast forward 12 years, and injuries to Pierre Spies and Danie Rossouw - and the apparent fall in Bob Skinstad’s stock - have resulted in Schalk Burger moving to number eight. The man-of-the-match performance against the United States suggests Burger the eighthman might just be an inspired move; tougher tests await, certainly, but the last time the Springboks won a World Cup, there was a makeshift number eight in place…