Ken Borland

Travelling to Kimberley and not having the right preparation, cohesion and mindset is often disastrous and that is why the Bulls on Friday named a powerful, URC-strength side for their Currie Cup match against Griquas at Tafel Lager Park on Saturday.

Eight of the starting XV who played last week in Italy have been included for Saturday’s Currie Cup encounter, and another eight who were on the bench against Zebre Parma will also be travelling to the Northern Cape.

“You can never underestimate Griquas,” Bulls Currie Cup coach Gert Smal explained, “and going to Kimberley can be really difficult if you’re not prepared. That’s why our team looks like that.

“It’s an important match for us to win and we haven’t played Currie Cup for a month, we are trying to get some rhythm and so it’s important for the team to have played together a bit.

“It’s always tough playing Griquas on their home ground but we want to see if we can beat them there. They are the giant-killers, but we will be ready for whatever is thrown at us, ready for the challenge.

“There are four areas we need to concentrate on and if we do them well then we will get the result: Griquas maul quite a lot, contestables, the breakdown and our mindset,” Smal said on Friday.

The top-of-the-log Sharks played the Pumas in Nelspruit on Friday night, going into the match with a four-point lead over the Bulls in third place, so the importance of Smal’s team getting four points in Kimberley is clear, because the last thing they want is for the KwaZulu-Natalians to open an eight-point lead on them.

“We take the Currie Cup seriously, we want to make sure we can win it,” Smal said. “We look at each game and choose the best team for that specific match, depending on how badly we feel we need the points.”

With the schedule allowing the Bulls to pick many of their best players, they will be looking to unleash their full might on Griquas.

Bulls team:Kurt-Lee Arendse, Canan Moodie, Stedman Gans, Cornal Hendricks, Richard Kriel, Chris Smith, Embrose Papier; Muller Uys, Arno Botha, Marcell Coetzee (CAPT), Janko Swanepoel, Walt Steenkamp, Robert Hunt, Bismarck du Plessis, Simphiwe Matanzima. IMPACT-Schalk Erasmus, Lizo Gqoboka, Kowie Roos, Reinhardt Ludwig, WJ Steenkamp, Keagan Johannes, Juan Mostert, Lionel Mapoe.

It took deep into the second half before the Bulls were able to finally rout a boisterous Zebre Parma side 45-7 in their United Rugby Championship match at the Stadio Sergio Lanfranchi at the weekend and coach Jake White admitted that his team had suffered from a bit of over-eagerness in the first half.

Several chances went abegging in the first half and it was only thanks to two tries in the last 10 minutes of the first half that the Bulls went into the break 17-7 up.

“In the first 25 minutes we had to find our feet, so we scored 45 points in the last 55 minutes,” White said. “At the beginning there were a few chances we did not finish, but I’m generally quite happy with the way we played.

“It’s not that easy to come here to Parma, not even Munster managed to score more than 34 points here in January and they are one of the great European sides.

“Zebre had also only lost three players to their national side and were relatively unchanged. So there are a lot of positives for us, especially the five points that means we stay in the competition, but we will keep our feet on the ground.

“You’ve got to earn the right to go wide, we went too quickly a couple of times and there were knock-ons. As soon as you become more direct then you create the space out wide,” White said.

While White questioned the small number of times his team was awarded penalties for Zebre being offsides, he did say he was pleased with the tempo of the game allowed by referee Adam Jones.

“The offsides maybe could have been policed better, Zebre would shoot off the line and we got caught a bit, they were coming at us the whole time,” White said.

“But I was very happy with the pace of the game, the tempo was what we need in the URC for us to compete. It was a significant difference to what we’ve been getting at home.

“There was pace on the ball, a much higher ball-in-play time, and that allowed us to keep putting them under pressure with wave-after-wave of attack. The referee managed that well.

“We want to attack, you need to score tries when you’re playing in a whole year long competition. You have to back yourself to put points on the board. To score 45 away from home is the outcome we wanted,” White said.

It looked like being another instalment in the Bulls’ woes on tour given their messy start, but the Currie Cup champions enjoyed an impressive second half as they hammered Zebre Parma 45-7 in their United Rugby Championship match at the Stadio Sergio Lanfranchi on Friday night.

Where the Bulls put things right

Having wasted half-a-dozen try-scoring chances through over-eagerness and impatience, the Bulls began demolishing their Italian opposition as soon as they turned to a more measured, patient build-up; attack by instalments if you like.

Allowing their massive ball-carriers up front to be more direct, the Zebre defence couldn’t just rush up on to the backline as they were doing before. Suddenly the Bulls were getting behind the gain-line with regularity and opening up the space for flyhalf Chris Smith to pull the strings and allow centre Lionel Mapoe and fullback Kurt-Lee Arendse to fulfil the attacking threat they displayed throughout.

Much to be happy about at flyhalf

Much has been said about the Bulls’ flyhalf crisis with Morne Steyn and Johan Goosen both unavailable at the moment.

So coach Jake White will be delighted by the assured showing of Chris Smith in the No.10 jersey.

Not only did he succeed with all six of his kicks at goal, a couple of them being right from the touchline, but his tactical game was excellent and he had much to do with the Bulls’ attacking flow.

He played a key role in the Bulls’ crucial first try of the second half, as they built on a 17-7 lead, staying on his feet really well under pressure from several tacklers and then freeing Arendse on a strong run that led to Marcell Coetzee’s try from close range.

Smith’s brilliant kick in the 62^nd minute gave the Bulls a 50/22 lineout, from which Mapoe burst through to score and make the game safe at 38-7.

Always trust the Bulls forwards to lay the attacking platform

While coach Jake White has ambitions of playing more expansive rugby, and he has exciting backs to do that, the Zebre win showed once again that he should always look to his superb pack to set the platform by dominating the gain-line.

Problems persist in the scrums & lineouts

The Bulls scrum did concede a couple of penalties in that set-piece, but it did not have a major effect on the game.

But the Bulls wasted several promising attacking positions due to their lineout failing, which will no doubt require work in the week ahead.

Scorers

Zebre Parma: Try – Antonio Rizzi. Conversion – Rizzi.

Bulls: Tries – Johan Grobbelaar, Embrose Papier, Marcell Coetzee, Arno Botha, Lionel Mapoe, Kurt-Lee Arendse. Conversions – Smith (6). Penalty – Chris Smith.

Juan Mostert has followed a similar road to Loftus Versfeld as the great Handre Pollard and he could get his first chance to shine at senior level as he was on Thursday named on the bench for the Bulls for their United Rugby Championship match against Zebre in Parma on Friday night.

Mostert has been named as the flyhalf cover for starting No.10 Chris Smith. The Bulls have something of a flyhalf crisis on the go at present as Morne Steyn is suspended for three weeks and Johan Goosen is out with a long-term knee injury.

So the 21-year-old Mostert has been lured out of a deal with the Seattle Seahawks for Major League Rugby and offered a two-year deal by the Bulls, whose director of rugby, Jake White, has been tracking the young talent’s career.

“Fortunately Juan had not quite done all the paperwork for the United States because Covid and visa requirements did not make it as easy as he thought it would. So we have signed him to stay,” White said on Thursday.

“He has a two-year deal and we’ll probably look to keep him for longer. He’s big and tall and he played for SA Schools and Paul Roos Gimnasium. He’ll be an understudy to Morne, Chris and Johan.

“He probably didn’t think he would get a chance so soon, but he’ll always be in the mix because he can play flyhalf, centre and fullback. Hopefully he can get on the field against Zebre and get a feel for this level.

“He’s had a bit of injury problems with a quad strain that has gone on for a while, but he’s got everything – pedigree of playing for South Africa at junior level and versatility,” White said.

Pollard was also schooled in the Western Cape (Paarl Gim) before heading to Pretoria and Mostert is even more of a physical specimen, being four centimetres taller than the Springbok star at 6’4”. Mostert starred for Maties in the Varsity Cup before his decision to further his career in America.

But when Jake White makes an advance, it’s probably best for a young rugby player to take up the offer. With Steyn already 37 years old, Goosen turning 30 in July and Smith 27, Mostert could well be the flyhalf of the future for the Bulls.

Bulls team:Kurt-Lee Arendse, Cornal Hendricks, Lionel Mapoe, Harold Vorster, Madosh Tambwe, Chris Smith, Embrose Papier; Elrigh Louw, Arno Botha, Marcell Coetzee (CAPT), Ruan Nortje, Walt Steenkamp, Jacques van Rooyen, Johan Grobbelaar, Gerhard Steenekamp. IMPACT -Bismarck du Plessis, Simphiwe Matanzima, Robert Hunt, Janko Swanepoel, WJ Steenkamp; Keagan Johannes, Juan Mostert, Canan Moodie.