Rugby World Cup 2019: Japan make one change ahead of South Africa match

William Tupou.
William Tupou. Photo credit: Image: Getty

Japan have made one injury-enforced change to the starting line-up for Sunday's Rugby World Cup quarter-final against South Africa, bringing Ryohei Yamanaka in at fullback in place of William Tupou.

Tupou suffered a concussion in Japan's win over Scotland at Yokohama last weekend and drops out of the match day 23 altogether, with livewire winger Lomano Lava Lemeki named among the replacements as cover for the back three.

Coach Jamie Joseph also made two changes to the forwards on the bench with Wimpie van der Walt and Amanaki Lelei Mafi replacing fellow big men Uwe Helu and Hendrik Tui for what is likely to be a physical battle against the Springboks.

Loosehead prop Jiwon Koo was forced off the pitch against the Scots by a rib injury but has recovered sufficiently to take his place in the front row.

Japan: 1-Keita Inagaki, 2-Shota Horie, 3-Jiwon Koo, 4-Luke Thompson, 5-James Moore, 6-Michael Leitch (c), 7-Pieter Labuschagne, 8-Kazuki Himeno, 9-Yutaka Nagare, 10-Yu Tamura, 11-Kenki Fukuoka, 12-Ryoto Nakamura, 13-Timothy Lafaele,14-Kotaro Matsushima, 15-Ryohei Yamanaka,

Reserves: 16-Atsushi Sakate, 17-Isileli Nakajima, 18-Asaeli Ai Valu, 19-Wimpie van der Walt, 20-Amanaki Lelei Mafi, 21-Fumiaki Tanaka, 22-Rikiya Matsuda, 23-Lomano Lava Lemeki.

Join us at 11:15pm Sunday for live updates of for the South Africa v Japan Rugby World Cup quarter-final. 

Reuters.