Ken Borland

Coach Jake White praised his bench for doing the business and claiming another late win in the Currie Cup final against the Sharks at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday, but this time the Bulls left it the latest of all their comebacks as they won with a try with just 72 seconds of extra time remaining.

Replacement loose forward Arno Botha, the senior member of the Bulls’ version of The Bomb Squad, scored both of their tries in the final, but it is the second one that will be remembered for many years to come as he reached over the line to break the 19-19 deadlock and seal a 26-19 win.

“It was incredible, with Covid, no crowd, the lightning stopping play in the first half; the team just had to adapt all the time and it will definitely be a final that will be remembered for a long time. I’m so proud of the team and I really enjoyed the way the bench came on and handled the pressure. Arno is one of our ‘captains’, he spoke well to the team and helped keep them calm.

“We’ve given guys like flyhalf Chris Smith and the reserve front row a lot of game time this season, where other teams have played their key guys for 80 minutes every game. I felt the time we have given the bench was a telling factor today, especially in injury time and extra time. They have grown as a group and they again showed their composure because this is not the only game they’ve come back to win,” White said after the gripping final.

The scrum was one of the few amenities where the Bulls had a clear advantage over the Sharks, but with referee Jaco Peyper, who controlled the feisty match extremely well, deciding not to make the final a penalty fest, the home side were only rewarded once with a penalty at the set-piece. It did come at a crucial time though as it set in motion the events that would lead to Botha’s first try, cutting the deficit to 16-19 in the 64^th minute.

“There were times we had go-forward at the scrum and in previous games we would have had the penalty advantage and been able to play. But today we never had that, we had to use the ball coming out. We had to adapt to that interpretation and I would have liked one or two scrum penalties. But we made life too easy for the Sharks at times, we gave them field position.

“The line-speed of the Sharks is also probably the best in the competition and maybe we tried to play a bit too much rugby in our half at times. Maybe we could also have chipped over the line a few times because we were caught behind the gain-line quite often. But the character we showed was amazing, it wasn’t our best game but it’s very good for the team to still win in that situation,” White said.

A try 72 seconds from the end of extra time by Arno Botha settled an industrial-strength clash and gave the Bulls the most dramatic of victories over the Sharks in a gripping Currie Cup final at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday.

The Bulls deserved the trophy for their incredible durability and simple refusal to be beaten however down-and-out they looked. And the Sharks certainly had one hand on the trophy when they led 19-9 with 15 minutes to go.

But the Bulls fought their way back. It started at a scrum, where they had been dominant for most of the afternoon but without getting much reward as referee Jaco Peyper decided not to make the final a penalty-fest. This time he did blow the Sharks up though as loosehead Ox Nche went down on his knee. The Bulls set the lineout and although the drive was stopped, they maintained possession, kept bashing away and earned another penalty, close to the poles. Captain Duane Vermeulen went old school with a tap-and-go by the pack, from which flank Botha forced his way over for the try.

The conversion by Morne Steyn and then a penalty by his replacement Chris Smith, after great runs by wing Stravino Jacobs and centre Cornal Hendricks, levelled the scores. Smith had a chance to win the final after the hooter for full time, but his angled penalty swung wide.

But it was Botha’s second try that will live long in the annals of Bulls rugby, after both Smith and Curwin Bosch had missed long-range penalties in the first half of extra time. A relentless Bulls pack kept driving forward and the veteran found enough space to get to the line and reach over the cup-winning try.

But for much of the game, the Currie Cup looked set to find new premises at Kings Park as the Sharks were winning the kicking game and destroying the Bulls at the breakdown. The first half was interrupted after 24 minutes, with the Bulls leading 6-3, by a 40-minute delay for lightning.

Bosch and Steyn traded penalties when they returned, before the Sharks opened up the game just before halftime when wing Sbu Nkosi powered over in the corner. Being behind 13-9 at the break was mostly down to the Bulls’ ill-discipline and own mistakes.

The try came after a Sharks player was taken out in the air and although Bosch missed that angled penalty, Steyn then sent the restart straight into touch. From the scrum on the 22, the Sharks spread the ball, fullback Aphelele Fassi joining from deep to create the extra man and Nkosi finishing with a leap through the cover-tackle.

The Bulls did not initially come out of the changeroom any better, conceding two more penalties to Bosch.

But what is clear, is that there is a great resolve and winning drive at Loftus Versfeld. They might not even have played the better rugby, but that’s why the Currie Cup has returned to Pretoria after an 11-year absence.

Scorers

Bulls – Tries: Arno Botha (2). Conversions: Morne Steyn, Chris Smith. Penalties: Steyn (3), Smith.

Sharks – Try: Sbu Nkosi. Conversion: Curwin Bosch. Penalties: Bosch (4).

In any Currie Cup final, there are going to be a number of key match-ups, but rugby writer Ken Borland looks at the three key ones that could decide the outcome of the match between the Bulls and Sharks at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday:

The battle of the flyhalves

Through the history of the Currie Cup, teams have consistently looked to the man with the number 10 on his back to steer them to the famous trophy. The Bulls relied on the legendary Naas Botha to win them seven titles, while Derick Hougaard was their liefling in the 2000s. Henry Honiball and Pat Lambie have been matchwinners for the Sharks.

On Saturday it will be the man who has seen it all before up against the young, rising star.

Veteran Morne Steyn has an enviable record when it comes to winning crunch matches with his accurate boot, but in his four Currie Cup finals for the Bulls he was lost twice and drawn once. The 36-year-old knows he won’t get too many other chances to lift the famous trophy again, so expect Steyn to be cool, calm, collected and very determined.

Curwin Bosch was at fullback when the Sharks won in 2018, but now he is his team’s undisputed general, racking up the points in ruthless fashion, even from his own half. With ball-in-hand, he is also capable of the sort of magic that wins finals.

The battle of the front rows

It is obvious that to have a chance of winning, the Sharks will need to match the physicality and brute strength of the Bulls up front. It will start in the scrums where tighthead Thomas du Toit is rapidly becoming the talisman of the Sharks. He is up against the power of Lizo Gqoboka, and the athleticism of the Bulls loosehead is also something to watch out for in open play.

Ox Nche, who played a key role in the triumph of the Free State Cheetahs in the 2019 Currie Cup, will come up against Trevor Nyakane, the rock of the Bulls scrum.

The breakdown battle

Quick possession is going to be at a premium and the Bulls have two jackalling loose forwards in Marco van Staden and Duane Vermeulen who are always eager to get their hands on the ball. The Sharks’ cleaners are going to have to be at their sharpest to nullify that threat.

But the Sharks have been effective when it comes to turnovers as well and Dylan Richardson made an absolute nuisance of himself at the breakdowns when they beat the Bulls in Durban last month. Referee Jaco Peyper will have his hands full policing this fiercely contested part of the game.

Bulls coach Jake White has never been averse to stirring up a bit of controversy and, although he does not have much of a social media presence he knows very well how to stoke up conversation before a big game. And in South African rugby, matches don’t get much bigger than the Currie Cup final, which the Bulls will host against the Sharks on Saturday.

But this week White, who admitted that he still feels the pressure of crunch matches, has been strangely restrained and even went as far as to suggest the Sharks might be favourites because half of their team have won the Currie Cup previously. Knowing how canny Jake is though, this is almost certainly some sort of mind game and he will ensure his Bulls team are the most inhospitable of hosts on Saturday.

That’s the thing about  the 57-year-old White, who has been a top-level coach now for almost 20 years, dating back to when he led the Junior Springboks to the U21 World Cup crown in 2002 – there is always a plan and it usually comes off. From utterly transforming a Springbok team that was in disarray in 2004 into World Cup champions in 2007, winning a rare Tri-Nations title along the way, he then took the Brumbies to the 2013 SuperRugby final and the Sharks to the 2014 semifinals, before leading Montpellier to the European Challenge Cup in 2016.

“I’ve been in enough finals and playoffs to know how it works and you can never take away the pressure. So I still feel the pressure and myself and the players will make mistakes, but a final brings the best out of certain players and they take their opportunities. There’s a real buzz in the squad, it’s so nice to be in the changeroom, you can just feel it.

“This is a very proud and driven team, they have a great hunger to win the Currie Cup and I just need to channel that the right way. I felt what it was like to win in the 2007 World Cup and I would like to taste that again, although it doesn’t get easier. But hopefully I can transfer my experience and the lessons I have learnt to the team. I’ll be trying to keep them calm and they must just enjoy the moment,” White said.

Sharks coach Sean Everitt (51) would have had a lot of interaction with White in 2014 because he was one of the Sharks’ assistant coaches, but the relationship between the head coach, his assistants and the players reportedly became strained leading to the World Cup winner spending just a year in Durban.

White was accused of being dictatorial but he has certainly softened since then, and is well-versed in global modern rugby trends.

Everitt’s coaching stock has certainly grown hugely since then as well, and Brad MacLeod-Henderson, who coached with him at the Sharks, winning the Currie Cup in 2013, described him as being a mentor who placed more responsibility on the players.

“Sean is more collaborative, he won’t pitch up and say ‘this is what we are going to do’. He will help the players make the right decisions, depending on the cues the opposition give them. As a former backline player, he’s more creative and he’s in favour of ball-in-hand rugby and having a go. But he wants the players to have a look first; if it’s on, have a go, if not, go to the air. It’s about space and getting the balance right.

“Sean is a great guy and all the players respond well to him being a good person. They have a lot of respect for him, he’s well-liked by the players and they will go the extra mile for him. He has created a good environment  and that’s why the players want to be in Durban because they’re happy on the field,” MacLeod-Henderson told Saturday Citizen on Friday.