The Munster second-rower becomes the first player to have previously played his international rugby for Ireland to return to his country of birth and play for the Springboks.

He will pair up with Marin Orie in the second this weekend as the World Champions get their international season underway.

Kleyn said as a kid the dream was always to play for South Africa.

“Playing for your home country will always be different,” said the Munster player.

“It was a great honour to play for Ireland as well, but I didn’t grow up as a young boy watching Paul O’Connell playing rugby and thinking, ‘geez, I want to play in his jersey’.

“I was watching Bakkies Botha run around smashing guys and thinking ‘one day, one day’”.

“You talk about childhood dreams coming true and that kind of thing, but here I am… things change.”

Saturday’s Test at Loftus Versfeld kicks off at 17:05.

Springboks - 15 Willie le Roux, 14 Kurt-Lee Arendse, 13 Lukhanyo Am, 12 André Esterhuizen, 11 Canan Moodie, 10 Manie Libbok, 9 Cobus Reinach, 8 Duane Vermeulen (captain), 7 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 6 Marco van Staden, 5 Marvin Orie, 4 Jean Kleyn, 3 Frans Malherbe, 2 Bongi Mbonambi, 1 Steven Kitshoff.

Replacements - 16 Joseph Dweba, 17 Thomas du Toit, 18 Vincent Koch, 19 RG Snyman, 20 Evan Roos, 21 Deon Fourie, 22 Grant Williams, 23 Damian Willemse.

Morgan Piek OFM Sport