KEY POINTS:
The All Blacks have won their last 29 Test matches at home. It would be a seismic upset if the Springbok team chosen for tonight's test ends that stunning sequence.
The Boks seek their first win on New Zealand soil in 10 years without their most experienced player, without the guy with the best ball playing skills at No 8 and with serious questions marks against three other key players.
Peter de Villiers' team looks long on hope, but may be worryingly short on accuracy, precision and power to handle the combination of the All Blacks and the Wellington weather.
The decision to leave Percy Montgomery on the bench is extraordinary.
In Wellington's likely rain and wind, Montgomery was a must-have selection.
He's been this way before, the only member of this squad to have won on New Zealand soil. Conrad Jantjes is a fine player but on the horses for courses principle, Montgomery had to start.
You can bet that, if it blows, All Black first five-eighth Dan Carter will attempt to expose a Springbok back three containing Jantjes and Odwa Ndungane to the severest of defensive examinations.
Neither Ndungane nor JP Pietersen are exactly heavyweights. But at least Pietersen has played in a World Cup final.
Fact is, the Springboks look worryingly short of physicality in two thirds of their back three. Adi Jacobs' inclusion gives him another chance to justify his selection, but against a physical All Blacks midfield of Ma'a Nonu and Conrad Smith, maybe Frans Steyn's physicality might have been more appropriate.
Up front, much depends on CJ Van der Linde to provide scrummage solidity. But the suspicion lingers he is a better loose head.
But the most contentious decision in the pack is the return of Joe van Niekerk. He is experienced but I find his selection a surprise.
Pierre Spies has the physicality, strength, pace and potential to become not just the top Springbok No 8 of the future but perhaps the best in the world.
Van Niekerk hardly represents all that and the future. But if another option were sought, Luke Watson's ball skills are best suited to No 8; he could have started.
De Villiers explained Van Niekerk's recall by saying: "He took the chance against Italy with both hands and earned his place."
But a grossly weakened Italy, at home in Cape Town offers a slightly reduced threat compared to New Zealand in Wellington.
Whichever way you look at it, an awful lot of horses are surely going to have to be in the form of their lives to come roaring home, if this new-look South African team is to win tonight.
