recently won the Currie Cup. Roos, who was the only player not to have undertaken a trial for the match as he was seen as a certainty for the team, was elected by the rest of the players to be the team captain. After being given the captaincy, Roos addressed the team by stating, "I would like to make absolutely clear at the outset we are not English-speaking or Afrikaans-speaking, but a band of happy South African"; as the tour took place just several years after the end of the Second Boer War, where once teammates had fought on different sides of the conflict. The tour to Britain, Ireland and France took in 29 matches, including Test games against the four Home Nations and a non-Test with the French national team. The tour began with great expectations, as the previous season had seen the Original All Blacks tour Britain with incredible success. The first 15 games were against club and county teams, with the South Africans victorious in every encounter, though they were run close by a strong Glamorgan County team. The first international encounter for the team was against Scotland, played in front of a record crowd of 30,000. Roos was forced to miss the game after he injured his collarbone in the encounter with Oxford University, and the captaincy was handed over to Paddy Carolin; the match ended in the first defeat for the South African's with Scotland scoring two tries in the second half. The Springboks were back on winning form the very next game against the North of Scotland, then travelled to Belfast to face Ireland. Roos lead his team out at the Balmoral Showgrounds. After the first half, Roos men were leading 3–12, but Ireland levelled the scores to 12–12 before a try from the wing settled the game in the South Africans' favour. The game against Wales was the most anticipated of the tour. Wales had been unofficially crowned the World's best team after a Triple Crown winning season in 1905 and a win over the All Blacks in the 'Game of the Century'. The Glamorgan team that had run the South Africans close earlier in the tour had contained twelve internationals, and the Welsh were keen for revenge. Despite this, Roos was a popular figure in Wales, and with his deep impressive voice and "pronounced Dutch accent", he had spoken at church meetings