Van der Flier on Boks' mentality: Rugby 'very personal for South Africans'

Ireland take on the hosts in the first Test of the tour on Saturday. 

Josh van der Flier and Jamie Osborne at St Peter's College, Johannesburg. Pic: INPHO/Dan Sheridan

Rugby is not just a game in South Africa. The overused cliché of it being like a religion is not far off the mark, especially for the Afrikaners but for all cultures in the Rainbow Nation.

Ireland's Josh van der Flier has toured South Africa sporadically since schooldays and played alongside, and against, South Africans for much of his career. He’s also recently been working with former Bok coach Jacques Nienaber at Leinster.