Duane Vermeulen confirms dislocated shoulder during Wales Test

by Matthew Wood Wednesday 28 November 2018

Duane Vermeulen's microphone incident has created speculation

©PA

South Africa's Duane Vermeulen has confirmed that he had sustained a dislocated shoulder during the recently concluded November series clash against Wales at Principality Stadium last weekend.

The 32-year-old seems to have suffered the blow by the half-hour mark but continued to play until the 64th minute when he was replaced by Francois Louw.

A television footage showed the Boks’ fitness coach Aled Walters handing a ear piece to Vermeulen during the fixture to have a chat with the South African coaching staff with captain Siya Kolisi not being part of it.

The incident created spark among social media that Kolisi's captaincy is being undermined with former South African player Thando Manana even adding to the speculation that Vermeulen will be the new captain of the national side next year.

Its a FACT: Duane Vermeulen will captain Springboks in 2019 pic.twitter.com/QwkH87yVv9
— ThandoManana (@TandoManana) November 24, 2018

However, South Africa head coach Rassie Erasmus played down the incident and said the discussion was about his injury which was also later confirmed by Vermeulen via his social media platform Twitter.

“I saw how Duane injured his shoulder and was holding it, while the doctor and physio were busy attending to other players,” Erasmus said.

“Aled didn’t see it but he was closest to Duane, so I asked him to ask Duane if he was okay. Duane couldn’t understand why he was asking and said he wanted to quickly talk to me himself. He told me his shoulder was too sore to continue playing.”