Ken Borland

“Our understanding is coming along nicely,” outside centre Marco Jansen van Vuren says of his midfield partnership with Cornal Hendricks, which has been one of the most unlikely success stories for the Bulls as they dominate local rugby.

It no doubt gives coach Jake White immense delight that he has moved a wing and a scrumhalf into midfield and made them a centre pairing that has proven to be one of the strengths of the Bulls on their way to winning the Currie Cup and now standing poised to reach the Rainbow Cup final.

The 24-year-old Jansen van Vuren had previously shuttled between the Lions, Valke and Bulls, battling to get decent game time as a scrumhalf. Coaches acknowledged that he was a talented footballer, but they just couldn’t find a regular slot for him. His Bulls appearances were initially on the wing, until White had the bright idea to shift him closer to the action when Springbok Sevens star Stedman Gans was injured.

Jansen van Vuren and Hendricks have certainly hit it off.

“Cornal has been really good at No.12 and as a centre pairing you have to understand each other. It was a challenge for me at first and then when Stedman was injured just before the Currie Cup semi-final I had to adapt as quickly as possible. The most important thing is understanding, knowing when and where to support each other. But it’s lekker to be next to Cornal, he’s a Springbok, one of the leaders.

“And he’s a good person – he even listens to me when I tell him he’s not doing the right thing! But it’s been quite a challenge for me to play in that channel, although now, playing a few games in a row for the first time, I feel like I’m finding my feet and getting that confidence there. I’m playing 80 minutes a game too so I’m settling in,” Jansen van Vuren said.

On Saturday in the decisive Rainbow Cup match against the Sharks in Durban, he will come up against Lukhanyo Am, one of the coolest cats wearing the No.13 jersey anywhere in the world.

“Lukhanyo is a great player, he won the World Cup, he’s one of the best in the world. It’s a lovely challenge, I’ve played against him a couple of times and he’s always up for it. But with the defensive system we have, we all trust each other and that makes it easier, especially when the wings and Cornal are doing very well.

“As a scrumhalf you are mostly just behind the defensive line and covering, you don’t spend much time in the frontline. But as an outside centre you have to make more decisions, is the ball going front door or back door? You need to make good decisions. But now I think it would be a big challenge for me to shift back to scrumhalf!” the 1.88m, 90kg Jansen van Vuren said.

The Sharks have to beat the Bulls and get a bonus point at Kings Park on Saturday if they are to be in the Rainbow Cup final, which means they have to score four tries. That will probably mean they will try to play an even quicker game against the Currie Cup champions, but captain Lukhanyo Am said on Tuesday that they also have to be smart in how they play.

If the Bulls score four tries and get a bonus point then it probably won’t matter who wins the game because their points difference is so much better than the Sharks that the home team would need to beat them by 34 points just to draw level. So Am’s charges can’t just throw caution to the wind and go all-out trying to just score as many tries as possible.

“We’re not going to shy away from our DNA, but the Bulls present a different threat to the Lions and we need to try and find the balance between running, flashy rugby and smart, tactical rugby on the right side of the field. We’ll want to bring energy and continuity and we’ll be trying our best to get into the final,” Am said on Tuesday.

This will be the last time the likes of Am, Makazole Mapimpi and Siya Kolisi will be playing for the Sharks until the end of the chockablock Springbok schedule towards the end of the year. The Sharks do, however, have nine players in the extended Springbok squad and their clash with the dominant force in domestic rugby for the last year will be thrilling.

*Perhaps the biggest surprise after the Sharks officially confirmed on Tuesday that Stormers hooker Bongi Mbonambi will be joining them at the end of the Lions tour was that the Springbok star had held out for so long before signing his new contract.

Mbonambi was already poised to join the Sharks back in March, when his Roc Nation stablemate Kolisi had already been unveiled as a key signing for the Durban franchise.

The talented 21-year-old Fez Mbatha has been the Sharks’ first-choice hooker recently, but Kerron van Vuuren and part-time flank Dylan Richardson have also had plenty of time in the middle of the front row. Former Maties and SA U20 hooker Dan Jooste is also under contract at Kings Park.

Gratitude was the first emotion Marco van Staden felt when he heard his name called out at the weekend for the Springbok squad to play in the series against the British and Irish Lions, and not just because he has not been a part of the national squad for a while.

Van Staden watched the live announcement with his parents and grandparents in the Magaliesberg mountains and he was delighted to share the best moment in his career thus far with the family members who sacrificed much so he could put rugby first, making it all the way to the top from a little agricultural school called Hoerskool Bekker. Especially since he is on his way overseas to play for English club Leicester Tigers as soon as his Springbok commitments are over.

“I was with my parents and grandparents and it was quite a celebration. I’m spending all the time I can with them because I’m going to be going overseas in a bit and I won’t be able to see them for a while. They sacrificed so much for me just to get me here, so it was wonderful to be able to share my selection with them.

“I was just very grateful, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, it only comes every 12 years, so it is a big privilege and I am very honoured to be chosen. I’ve missed out on the Springboks in the last couple of years, I’ve only played three Tests and the last one was against Argentina just before they left for Japan for the World Cup,” Van Staden said on Tuesday.

On Saturday he will play his last game for the Bulls, in their decisive Rainbow Cup match against the Sharks in Durban, and adding to the poignancy is the fact that Duane Vermeulen and Elrigh Louw, the two players with whom Van Staden has bedded in so well as a loose trio, will both be missing through injury.

“It’s probably my last game for the Bulls so I want to make the most of it. It will be disappointing to not play together with Duane and Elrigh, because I think we have gelled together well. But Marcell Coetzee will be there and it’s an honour to play with him, he also gives his all out on the field. We’re all just trying to play for the guys next to us,” Van Staden said.

The 25-year-old also said there was no room for individual battles in Saturday’s match, which will see the Bulls needing to collect just one bonus point to book a place in the Rainbow Cup final, although there will be much jostling for places in the Test 23 amongst the 46 players in the Springbok squad.

“My focus is not on playing against Siya Kolisi. The team has a plan to execute and you don’t want to be out of position to make a point of your own. I will be staying within the plan and there’s no question of holding back because I don’t see the benefit in that. I just remember how we could not play any rugby in Lockdown and to not give 100% would be disappointing my team-mates,” Van Staden said.

With the first-choice Springbok pack hit by injuries, it makes little sense for the squad for the British and Irish Lions series to be loaded with outside backs, but that’s exactly what coach Jacques Nienaber and director of rugby Rassie Erasmus have done.

Their 46-strong Springbok squad contains eight outside backs, the most well-stocked department of all with one more player than either the loose forwards or props. The allocation of seven loose forwards includes Duane Vermeulen, who suffered what looked like a serious ankle injury at the weekend, and amongst the six locks named for the series, two of them – Lood de Jager and RG Snyman – are still injured.

There are two utility forwards included in Jean-Luc du Preez and Rynhardt Elstadt, but the cynical might surmise that the outside backs have been overstocked in order to get the transformation numbers up – there is only one White player amongst the back three in fullback Willie le Roux.

“Local derbies are like Springbok trials and when you play strength versus strength week in, week out, like the Rainbow Cup has been, then you expect a number of injuries. So every weekend has been quite nervous for us, fortunately there haven’t been too many injuries, but there are many niggles in the squad. We’ll have to reassess after the first couple of weeks.

“But the good thing is our local players will be used to physical rugby, which will be a big part of the Lions series. The big question is when is a player 100% ready for Test rugby, when do we experiment? We play Georgia twice, but we have not played together since the World Cup, so we don’t want to experiment there,” Erasmus said.

Erasmus admitted that he was not optimistic that Vermeulen will be available for the Lions series, and the uncapped Jasper Wiese is likely to replace him at eighthman, with the World Cup winning coach saying the 25-year-old’s form for the Leicester Tigers in the English Premiership cannot be ignored.

“Duane has to be doubtful with his ankle. He’s on his way to Cape Town for scans. I spoke to Jake White [Bulls coach] and it looked bad. For Duane to limp off so early in a match is very unusual, so we are fearing the worst,” Erasmus admitted.

“But Jasper Wiese can play eighthman and we cannot ignore the form he is in, he was outstanding in the Premiership and he knocked the door down weekly. He is explosive and we’re really lucky that he’s versatile, he can play openside as well.”

In just 14 Premiership appearances, the former Free State Cheetahs player has made 701 running metres, beaten 54 defenders, has a 90% tackle success rate and has made eightline-breaks.