Of the full-strength team, some of the great Springbok names will reach the end of the road at the World Cup - Smit, Rossouw, Victor Matfield, Bakkies Botha and Fourie du Preez - but there will be a good sprinkling of players in their late 20s who will continue, including big names Schalk Burger (the probable new captain), Bryan Habana and Jaque Fourie, and around that framework will be threaded today's youngsters.
Winger Lwazi Mvovo has scorching pace, centre Juan de Jongh is a wicked stepper, on the other wing Bjorn Basson is an exceptional finisher, lock Alistair Hargreaves - a former captain of the SA Under 19 and Under 21 teams - has a very good pedigree, and the young Bulls props Werner Kruger and Dean Greyling are as strong as, well, oxen.
The second-rower making his debut, Gerhard Mostert, is nearly 2m tall and 117kg with an attitude to match.
But of them all, baby-faced assassin Patrick Lambie has a very special talent. At age 20 he's cool, calm, composed and equally at home at 10, 12 or 15. He's going to be a great and is destined to captain the Springboks in an illustrious career.
But for this young brigade, today's match has come a season too soon - not as individuals but as a collective.
The talent is there, the know-how at this level is not. They hopefully will be better than they were against the Wallabies last week when they fluffed the lines they'd practised solidly for three weeks - they spent a fortnight in a camp in Cape Town, so they were well prepared. They knew what to do but they froze.
Today they'll be much better, but it's still early days for the baby Boks.