JOOST van der Westhuizen has days rather than a week to make his mind up whether to join Newport or stay in South Africa.

The ball is now firmly in his hands after a meeting with the South African Rugby Union which lasted over five hours yesterday.

They offered him a new contract, anxious to keep him on board, while they also dropped any threats against Newport for not acting within International Board rules.

They gave him a week to make up his mind, but he will have to make a decision this weekend because he is booked on a flight out of South Africa on Monday night.

"Joost has got to decide within days," said Newport backer Tony Brown, who has spent many long hours on the telephone to try to broker the deal.

Though van der Westhuizen, pictured, has signed a one-year contract with another year's option with Newport, Brown will not enforce it if he decides to stay in South Africa after the eleventh hour bid to keep him.

Brown would, however, ask for the transfer fee, which has been paid to van der Westhuizen's province, the Blue Bulls, back

"We have a contract which is legally enforceable, but it would be wrong to get a player over here who is unhappy," said Brown.

He also indicated that if the player does not come he will try to bring in another overseas player.

"It's late in the day, but we would have to start looking around because if Joost doesn't come we would still have an option for an overseas player," he said.

"It's now down to Joost to make a decision on his future.

"It's a positive move as it puts the decision into the player's hands. SARFU have dropped all threats of action against Newport as a club for alleged improper conduct and have told the player he is free to join Newport if he rejects the SARFU contract."

South Africa's national teams manager Butch Watson-Smith said: " We had a good discussion with Joost and we accept it is not an easy decision for him.

"The discussions were frank and everyone was up front about their situations."