Vermeulen hopes Sharks move opens Bok door

Exeter loose forward Jacques Vermeulen hopes his move to Sale Sharks helps make his Springbok dream come true.

The 30-year-old played for Western Province and the Durban-based Sharks before heading to England in 2019.

Vermeulen has made 105 appearances for Exeter, helping them win both the English Premiership and Champions Cup in the 2019-20 season.

But they have struggled recently, and go into their final Premiership match of the season, against Sale at Sandy Park, languishing in ninth position on the 10-team table with just four wins from 17 matches.

In stark contrast, Sale are third and targeting the semi-finals.

“I still obviously want to play international rugby – if I get the opportunity to one day maybe play for the Springboks that will obviously be a dream come true,” Vermeulen told BBC Sport.

“I do think that obviously new season, new team, I think they’ve got some really good players,” he said of Sale. “If you win trophies and stuff with a team I think that just makes it so much easier for you to get into international set ups.

“We’ve seen it now with Northampton Saints like Juarno Augustus – he was never in the picture and he goes in a Champions Cup final and into the Springboks set-up.

“It just shows you if you play in finals and semi-finals that opens the door for higher honours.”

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Vermeulen said Exeter’s 2024-25 season – in which they also lost all four of their Champions Cup pool matches – had been “really frustrating” following a period of success.

“You go through three years where you play every year in finals and you create such good friendships,” he explained.

“Then you go through one off-season and you basically lose half your mates and all the guys that you basically played with for the last three years.

“You get like a whole bunch of new lads in, then it’s quite tough because at Exeter and the university you’ve got a lot of young lads, it’s quite hard to connect with them.

“They’re all good lads, but they’ve got a lot to learn in a rugby sense, how to win games, how to knuckle down on what areas you need to be good at.

“I think that will come for them, but I just thought like when I made the decision ‘these lads need to write their own stories’.”

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