Ken Borland

A dismal first half put all their hard work this year at risk, but the Blue Bulls came storming back in the second half to beat the Eastern Province Kings 48-27 in their Currie Cup match at Loftus Versfeld on Friday night to stay on track for a home semi-final.

The Bulls trailed 17-20 at half-time as the Eastern Cape side pondered a sensational victory in Pretoria, but two moments of dazzling brilliance by scrumhalf Francois Hougaard led to tries in the 56^th and 66^th minutes as the home side pulled clear for a comfortable bonus-point victory. With the Cape mourning her side’s 62-32 thrashing at the hands of the Lions at Ellis Park, the Bulls now have a four-point lead over Western Province heading into the final weekend of round-robin action.

The Bulls’ defence around the fringes was woefully absent in the first half as centre Tim Whitehead and flyhalf Elgar Watts scored tries after breaks by side-stepping wing Sylvian Mahuza and scrumhalf Enrico Acker respectively.

They came out a different side after coach Nollis Marais no doubt laid down the law in the half-time break, and they employed the rolling maul to good effect, with Lappies Labuschagne (twice), centre Dries Swanepoel and replacement flank Ruan Steenkamp all scoring from the drive, which also caused two Kings players to be yellow-carded – replacement front-rankers Edgar Marutlulle and Schalk Ferreira.

Hougaard’s own try was a scintillating 55m effort as he broke from the back of a retreating scrum and beat half-a-dozen defenders with blinding pace, while he broke blind from a lineout drive 10 minutes later, Steenkamp cracking on the pace before passing back to the scrumhalf, who juggled and stumbled but powered on to within a couple of metres from the line,  substitute prop Werner Kruger scoring from the resultant ruck.

Scorers

Blue Bulls – Tries: Lappies Labuschagne (2), Dries Swanepoel, Francois Hougaard, Werner Kruger, Ruan Steenkamp, Jacques du Plessis. Conversions: Tian Schoeman (4), Louis Fouche. Penalty: Schoeman.

EP Kings – Tries: Tim Whitehead, Elgar Watts, JP du Plessis. Conversions: Scott van Breda (3). Penalties: Van Breda (2).

Storming Cell C Sharks loose forward Jean Deysel will be unavailable for four-to-six weeks after injuring his ankle, but the fabulous news for the KwaZulu-Natal team is that Springbok regular Willem Alberts is back to full fitness and ready for action again.

Deysel, who has earned four Springbok caps himself, had what the Sharks termed a “small procedure” on his ankle after the unfortunate defeat to the Bulls and is currently on crutches.

But the return of Alberts for this weekend’s crunch encounter with the Stormers at Newlands, four weeks into the competition, can barely have come at a better time for a Sharks team that has just one victory under their belts.

Alberts has been training at full intensity for two-and-a-half weeks now and is likely to be unleashed against the South African Conference leaders on Saturday.

Renaldo Bothma has been outstanding for the Sharks thus far, so Deysel’s absence will hardly be felt with either Alberts or the former Pumas hard man taking the empty place on the bench.

Currie Cup captain Tera Mtembu is also in contention and, as he pointed out on Tuesday, there is plenty of depth at loose forward for the Sharks.

“Every guy who has stood in has done well and it’s a good headache for the coach. It’s awesome to have Willem back and he’s raring to go, but Renaldo has done very well at number seven as well,” Mtembu said.

While a lot of the blame for the Sharks’ defeat to the Bulls can be laid at the door of poor officiating, Mtembu said the team has to shoulder the responsibility for their own shortcomings.

“Obviously it was a disappointing result and we’ve been working hard on certain things for the last two days to rectify them. The main thing is our consistency. We didn’t start well against the Cheetahs, we were awesome against the Lions and then we let ourselves down last weekend. That can’t go on. The energy is there, we just need to be smarter in our decision-making,” Mtembu said.

The return of hugely experienced backs Frans Steyn and JP Pietersen to the Sharks fold will also help them to match an in-form Stormers backline.

Not all players going to Japan come back in tiptop condition, but Steyn and Pietersen are both looking in tremendous shape.

“They’ll definitely give us a lift, as old as they are, they both want to do well, they bring a lot of energy and they are going to inspire the guys around them,” Mtembu said.

The Sharks team to travel to Cape Town will be announced on Thursday.

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Lanky Englishman Chris Wood will be back at next week’s Africa Open at East London Golf Club for the first time since 2012 hoping to right what he might feel was the injustice of 2011, when he lost in a three-way playoff with Louis Oosthuizen and Spain’s Manuel Quiros.

Wood fired a four-under-par 68 on the final day to catch Oosthuizen and Quiros. The 18^th was the first playoff hole and Wood safely found the fairway with his blind tee-shot, while Oosthuizen hooked his drive left, but the South African was fortunate to have a good lie and then produced a superb approach shot to eight feet of the flag.

Wood’s 25-foot birdie putt looked on course for the cup until it just faded away on the last few rolls, narrowly missing the hole, while Quiros was on the fringe and could not chip in for birdie. So it was Oosthuizen who holed out for birdie and his third European Tour title.

Wood is joined at the co-sanctioned Sunshine Tour/European Tour event by fellow highly-rated Englishmen Oliver Wilson and David Howell, but just to add even more spice to the Africa Open, there is a strong contingent of Frenchmen, their arch-enemies from across the Channel, coming to East London.

Julien Quesne has had a tough start to the year, including the black mark of a disqualification from the Dubai Desert Classic at the start of February, but he is a two-time European Tour winner and a regular visitor to South Africa.

Gregory Bourdy is the man many are tipping for success at the Africa Open as he is the third highest-placed competitor in the Race to Dubai, at 22^nd, while Raphael Jacquelin, the father of four children with wife Fanny, is a four-time European Tour winner. He dreamed of playing professional football before having to give that up due to a knee injury when he was 13 and he initially switched to tennis before taking up golf with great success.

In terms of current newsmakers playing at East London Golf Club, none is bigger than Darren Clarke, the former Open champion who has just been named as Europe’s next Ryder Cup captain, while spectators will also get the chance to see one of the future stars of the tour in 21-year-old Italian Matteo Manassero.

Andrew Dodt, fresh off his victory in the Thailand Classic which lifted him to 13^th in the Race to Dubai, and Brett Rumford, who grew up in Perth, a city that shares East London’s reputation for being windy, are coming from Down Under.

Jeev Milkha Singh was the trailblazer for Indian golf and has entered the Africa Open, but Shiv Kapur, one of the rising stars who fell in behind him, is the highest-ranked golfer from the sub-continent in action in East London, at 68^th in the Race to Dubai and 240^th in the world rankings.

Another Asian talent, South Korea’s Jin Jeong, finished tied second in last year’s Joburg Open and the time may have come for the former world number one amateur to claim his second European Tour title.

But it is English golf that is really taking the European Tour by storm this season and, apart from Wood, SA Open champion Andy Sullivan, Wilson and Howell, Robert Dinwiddie had an excellent Africa Open last year, finishing seventh, just two shots off the playoff, and Matthew Nixon had a strong finish over the weekend with rounds of 68 and 67.

Clearly, South African golfers are going to have their work cut out to ensure that the internationals have to wait a little longer for their first Africa Open title.

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A strong contingent of local golfers will tee it up at the South African Open at Glendower Golf Club from Thursday as most of the country’s biggest stars go in search of bringing the national open crown back to these shores for the first time since 2011.

A home golfer has not won the South African Open since Hennie Otto’s triumph at Serengeti Golf Club in 2011 and former champions Ernie Els and Richard Sterne, as well as top contenders Charl Schwartzel, who has just overtaken Tiger Woods in the world rankings, Branden Grace and George Coetzee will all be gunning for the prestigious title of the game’s second oldest national open.

Louis Oosthuizen has sent his apologies and is the major South African absentee, but there is plenty of other home-grown talent for fans to enjoy with Jake Roos, Jacques Blaauw, Darren Fichardt, J’be Kruger, Dawie van der Walt, Danie van Tonder, Jaco van Zyl, Jaco Ahlers, Thomas Aiken and Jean Hugo all having entered.

However, there is also a powerful overseas contingent coming to Edenvale aiming for a third successive overseas win. Denmark’s Morten Orum Madsen is back for his title defence, aiming to become the first golfer to win back-to-back titles since Trevor Immelman in 2003/4.

Edoardo Molinari, who impressed for Europe in the 2010 Ryder Cup, will be one of the favourites from offshore, but any of Peter Uihlein, Pablo Martin, Anders Hansen, Paul Lawrie, Niclas Fasth or Andy Sullivan could continue the recent foreign dominance in the South African Open.

The final field of 166 entrants has yet to be printed, however, with 377 golfers aiming for the last 12 spots at the qualifiers to be held on Tuesday at Kempton Park, Zwartkops and Irene.