Luke Watson will not captain the Stormers next season with a decision already taken at Newlands that World Cup-winning flank Schalk Burger will lead the team into battle in next year's Super 14.
Asked about this development on Wednesday, Watson refused to comment. "Unfortunately I am not available for an interview at this moment, thank you very much," said the 24-year-old who was named Western Province captain under former coach Kobus van der Merwe last season and went on to skipper the Stormers in this year's campaign.
Nevertheless, it has been reliably learned that the decision to make Burger, 24, captain of the team has already been taken.
Burger was captain of the SA Under-21 side in 2003 and Watson captained the SA Schools side in 2001. Watson attended Grey High in Port Elizabeth, where he was born.
However, Springbok coach Jake White first drew flak in his deteriorating relationship with Watson by not including him in his 2003 SA Under-21 side, a team captained by Burger, that was selected months before White went on to be named Springbok coach.
Erasmus had also considered Springbok centre Jean de Villiers as his captain, but it is debatable whether the injured midfielder will be fit in time for the start of the season after injuring his bicep in South Africa's opening World Cup match against Samoa.
The prognosis for recovery was up to six months.
The decision to drop Watson as captain of the Stormers has left the flank in the position of having to fight for his place in the side next season against a host of rivals, including Joe van Niekerk (should the Springbok be contracted), former Gloucester captain Jake Boer, David Hendricks and Justin Melck.
It was yesterday revealed in the Cape Argus that Van Niekerk is back in Cape Town after his contract with UK club Northampton appeared to be terminated over his medical records and history of injury.
The pre-season Stormers training squad will only be announced next week after a meeting to finalise the contracted players next Friday.
Watson had a barnstorming season for the Stormers last season when there was a strong lobby for him to be included in the Springbok squad. However, White stood firm in his conviction that the WP flank would prove to be a divisive influence and refused to select him.
That was until this year, when a lobby group that included SA Rugby president Oregan Hoskins, deputy president Mike Stofile and Springbok team manager Zola Yeye forced White to pick Watson for the Ellis Park Test against Samoa.
Before Watson had joined the squad, his father Cheeky had made comparisons between his son's predicament on joining the Bok squad in Bloemfontein and the biblical character Daniel going into the Lion's den.
Watson had also stood alongside Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool, who said he regarded the flank as a black player due to his family turning their back on apartheid rugby by playing for a black club during their playing days in Port Elizabeth.
However, after talking up a storm before his Test debut, much of the support and sympathy for Watson's Springbok cause evaporated after he played a poor game at Ellis Park and was substituted.
In addition, the Springbok players refused to initiate him into the team, along with Sharks centre Waylon Murray, saying he was not chosen by either White or the selectors and, if anything, his kontiki should be performed by Hoskins, Stofile and Yeye.
However, Watson did not live up to the hype of his Test debut and it came at a time when reports said that his Springbok teammates were unwilling to put him through the initiation process.
Watson also picked up a rib injury in the match and was ruled out of Currie Cup rugby for the rest of the season after playing for only 40 minutes against the Sharks. This was in spite of former coach Van der Merwe's original prognosis that he would only be sidelined for 10 days.
In addition, Watson clashed with Van der Merwe after being substituted in the second half of the Stormers match against the Bulls at Loftus on a day when the Cape side were given another hiding in Pretoria.
After a dressing room bust up between the player and coach, Watson had not appeared at the post-match press conference.
During the match the players had rallied around Burger towards the end of the game when the former IRB Player of the Year had told them: "The time for talking up a big game and running out and getting humiliated like this is over."
Burger, who came back from a potentially career ending neck injury to play in every single Super 14 game this season for the Stormers, is seen as an influential captain who can unite a fragmented Stormers.