Boks star van der Merwe gets back to basics with Leinster

Heinke van der Merwe returned from international duty earlier this week keen to add to his list of caps with South Africa but first priority for the Springbok will be finding a spot in Leinster’s front row.

The European champions had six front rowers playing Test rugby this last three weeks with van der Merwe, Cian Healy, Richardt Strauss, Mike Ross, Sean Cronin and Michael Bent all featuring consistently over the November period.

Few teams could cope with such a drain of personnel in one sector, not to mention such a key one, but Leinster’s resources were there to see last weekend when the senior side claimed a 6-0 win in Scotstoun and the A side took care of business in the Sportsground against Connacht.

That’s a total of 18 hookers and props in action for club or country in the space of a two-day period and, with Bent to be registered for Europe next week, Leinster would now appear to have two dependable options for all three front-line berths.

The expectation is that their return will stabilise a sector that betrayed its inexperience and unfamiliarity through the concession of a fair share of penalties in PRO12 contests against Ospreys and Glasgow.

“We have to go back to the drawing board and stick to the basics,” said van der Merwe on his return from London. “We have to take it game to game and start training and playing together again and work on the small stuff. It can be sorted.”

Zebre at the RDS on Saturday will be a chance to reconstitute themselves as a collective before the trip to France a week later where they face a Clermont Auvergne side that has trumped all comers on home turf since November 2009. The back-to-back meetings between that heavyweight pair has been tagged as a defining contest in this year’s tournament and all the more so now with Clermont top of the pool and just two points off the Top 14 summit.

Leinster’s form has been patchy but Joe Schmidt spoke on Monday about the benefits of welcoming back internationals in a “good head space” after the win over Argentina and van der Merwe will have added to that feelgood factor.

The 27-year old was focusing purely on club matters this month before being called into Heyneke Meyer’s Springbok squad for their European tour after a number of injury withdrawals and he ended up appearing for a total of 50 minutes across the hat-trick of wins against Ireland, Scotland and England.

He quadrupled the amount of caps he possessed after his debut against Wales in Cardiff five years ago and the experience has left him hopeful that his country may yet call on his services again despite.

“Hopefully. The depth in South African rugby is great,” he explained, “To be part of that is great and it is good to know I can be (considered) even though I am overseas.”