ZACHARY Porthen is not your typical tighthead prop.
In fact, he wasnt a prop until he got to high school, having first played at No 8 in his formative years.
Now, he is about to lead his country into battle as the captain of the Junior Springboks at the World Rugby Under-20 Championship in the Western Cape.
The Junior Boks open their tournament against Fiji at the Cape Town Stadium tonight (7pm kick-off), and Porthen follows in the footsteps of a number of Western Province players who have captained the SA Under-20 side over the last decade.
That list includes his predecessor Paul de Villiers, and before that, Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu (2022) who made his senior Springbok debut just last weekend against Wales at Twickenham Salmaan Moerat (2018), Ernst van Rhyn (2017) and Handr Pollard (2014).
