Jordan Hendrikse of Lions has broken his ankle and will be out of action for several months. Picture: Richard Huggard/Gallo Images
The Lions have suffered a major blow with the news that flyhalf Jordan Hendrikse has broken his right ankle and will be out of action for several weeks.
The young No 10 will return to South Africa from Europe where the Lions are playing in the United Rugby Championship. He may undergo surgery on his return and is expected to be out of action for three months, leaving the Lions with few options at No 10.
Another concern for the Lions will be the availability of prop Ruan Dreyer who went off the field with an injury against Scarlets last weekend.
“Unfortunately it looked like Ruan Dreyer might have an upper arm injury and Jordan (Hendrikse) came off with an ankle (injury), the ankle doesn’t look too good so we have to wait for a scan and make a call from there,” said coach Ivan van Rooyen after the Scarlets game.
“It is a challenge (to bring in replacements). I think the soonest we could get someone ready is game four against Ulster… he’d probably have to fly somewhere to isolate for 10 days and then join us, so if we need to jump we would have to do it quickly to get someone ready for two games from now.”
ALSO READ: Lions searching for answers after first URC defeat
The Lions meanwhile, will be aiming for a big improvement when they take on Glasgow Warriors in the URC at the Scotstoun Stadium in Glasgow on Saturday.
It has been an up and down start to the competition for the Lions who claimed a bonus point win against Zebre before suffering a heavy defeat against Scarlets this past weekend and they will need to sharpen up on a number of facets ahead of the coming match.
Against Scarlets the Lions made a number of basic errors while their set pieces failed to fire which led to the hosts controlling the match throughout.
“We really pride ourselves on our set piece and it wasn’t good enough, that’s why when we went to the corner (against Scarlets) we didn’t get the reward for that, so it is definitely something we have to fix as soon as possible,” admitted Lions captain Burger Odendaal.
Another facet they will have to fix ahead of the Warriors match is when to kick and when to run, with that costing the Lions in the Scarlets game.
“When we are patient in our kicking game we manage to put pressure on teams and when we make individual errors we spend a lot of time in our half,” explained Van Rooyen.
“When we get hold of the ball and look after it we looked a lot more dangerous, so we have to look after the ball to build pressure on attack and if we kick it has to be on our terms so that is definitely two areas we need to improve on.
“We know they (Glasgow Warriors) want to play a nice attacking brand of rugby, so there is one or two things we need to sort out there defensively and the speed we are moving at before we want to set, and vice versa if we can manage to string our attack together I think we can apply a lot of pressure onto them.”
The Lions also announced on Monday afternoon that they had signed prop JP Smith for the next two years and UCT flyhalf James Tedder on a trial basis.