Ken Borland

The Bulls had to come from a 13-0 deficit to beat Benetton Treviso 46-29 in their United Rugby Championship match at Loftus Versfeld at the weekend, and coach Jake White said he was most pleased by the adventurous rugby they played under pressure to do so.

The Bulls scored six tries to make it a bonus point win and only two of those tries were scored by forwards driving over from close range.

“What I was most pleased about was the brand of rugby we played, but we did not finish enough of our chances,” White said after the win. “There was a nice balance to our rugby, we used our forwards and our backs.

“You’re not going to win this competition by winning matches 13-9, you need to score tries, and how we counter-attacked and looked to play with ball-in-hand was most enjoyable to watch.

“Like when Kurt-Lee Arendse [fullback] runs from his own half to score, that’s where rugby is going. You have to be able to play like that, you need different arrows in your bow.

“We’re still not close to where we want to be, but it was good that we showed we can muscle up and use our maul as well. To be 13-0 down and still win 46-29 shows a lot of character,” White said.

The Bulls have been criticised in the past for their lack of creativity, some going as far as to liken them to the marvellous athletes but mechanical players of Russia under Communism, but those days are long gone.

The Bulls could, in fact, have scored a few more tries and the finishing, as well as the finer technical details of their breakdown work, are two areas White says need work.

“One can always be critical after a match and we were a bit inaccurate at the breakdown and three or four times our clearance kicks did not go far enough,” White said.

“We just needed to show more calm and not be so hasty. There were also three or four times we were on their tryline but we let the ball fall.

“The slow start was maybe because we haven’t played for two weeks, but we got in their 22 many times but did not finish. We’re not going to get 10 chances against one of the big sides.

“But Benetton were very tough physically and they did not go away, we had to work hard to break down their defence on the goal-line. We definitely have to improve,” White said.

The British and Irish Lions were successfully able to check the Springboks’ momentum in the second half as they turned a 3-12 halftime deficit into a 22-17 win in an enthralling first Test in Cape Town on Saturday.

A focused Springbok side had ticked all the boxes in the first half, putting in an impressively controlled performance considering how much talk there has been about them being underdone. In contrast, the Lions seemed to be the side who were over-excited by the magnitude of the occasion, conceding several penalties.

Springbok flyhalf Handre Pollard gave a polished display and kicked all four of his shots at goal in the first half. South Africa dominated territory and held on to the ball with composure, building phases and pressure. Their defence was also typically effective and, having taken the 12-3 lead, they had to repel a concerted onslaught from the Lions. They did so, but the Lions also missed a couple of penalties and made other errors that prevented them from closing the gap.

The momentum carried into the second half, however, and the Lions were given a great attacking platform by two soft penalties – Kwagga Smith getting up with the ball after he had been tackled and then a high tackle by Eben Etzebeth, who had been the dominant force around the rucks.

Four minutes into the second half and the Lions had the first try, hooker Luke Cowan-Dickie going over from the lineout drive.

The fire in the Springboks was not quite quelled just yet though and they roared back with Willie le Roux dotting down in the corner, but the try was disallowed because the TMO ruled he was in front of the kicker.

But two minutes later, TMO Marius Jonker awarded the try after Pieter-Steph du Toit had picked up a wayward pass, burst clear and passed out wide to Makazole Mapimpi. Du Toit then attempted to collect the wing’s deft kick infield, but seemed to over-run the ball, with scrumhalf Faf de Klerk then picking up and scoring. Jonker ruled that Du Toit’s hands had missed the ball, which bounced off his leg.

In both cases, replays suggested the under-pressure South African TMO was quite correct.

Pollard crucially missed the conversion and it was the first sign that the Boks were starting to flag, to lose their intensity.

The Lions went back to basics, adopted the tactics associated with the Springboks – the box-kick and the rolling maul – and the home side were not able to handle their own weapons being turned against them. The territory statistics turned around totally.

The pressure led to a trio of penalties kicked by Dan Biggar, in the 52^nd, 57^th and 63^rd minutes. The coup de grace was landed by replacement Owen Farrell, with a penalty two minutes from full time.

The failure of the bench to make much impact will probably be the biggest concern for the Springboks, seeing as though it was the key component of their World Cup triumph.

Scorers

South Africa – Try: Faf de Klerk. Penalties: Handre Pollard (4).

British & Irish Lions – Try: Luke Cowan-Dickie. Conversion: Dan Biggar. Penalties: Biggar (4), Owen Farrell.

Sharks coach Sean Everitt was asked after their Rainbow Cup hammering at the hands of the Bulls at Loftus Versfeld what went wrong when they ran back out on to the field for the second half, and his simple answer was they were “manhandled”, which is why a 9-12 halftime deficit turned into a 43-9 hiding.

And it was the magnificent Bulls pack who did the damage, Duane Vermeulen once again being the talisman as the home forwards dominated the lineouts, scrummed powerfully, were commanding at the maul and without mercy on the gainline.

“The Bulls forwards were outstanding and forced us to give away penalties. They dominated us physically and we had no answer, which was disappointing. We battled to stop their maul and that led to penalty on top of penalty, for which we paid the price this time. We were manhandled.

“Conceding a penalty at the maul just compounds the problem because then they kick to the corner and maul again. And when we were in a good position, we would have a lineout turnover or concede a penalty at the scrum. So it’s not as if they exploited our game-plan, but rather the fundamentals of the game which we did not get right,” Everitt said after the heavy defeat.

The Sharks coach did not feel that his team were particularly ill-disciplined, but said an enormous penalty count against them was rather due to an unrelenting battering they were receiving. The Bulls were truly merciless and flyhalves Morne Steyn and Chris Smith converted all nine of their kicks at goal.

“I can’t fault the effort in the first half, when we stuck to the plan well and fired all the shots – the Bulls did not look like scoring. We attacked well in that first half, I thought our plan was well-balanced between kicking and ball-in-hand, but then we’d lose the ball out wide. It was just a case of not being able to convert.

“But in the second half they made us tired and fatigued and it’s always a tough day when you’re going backwards and conceding penalties. You have to credit the Bulls, they were outstanding, they hardly made a mistake and they kept us out. They have improved a lot under Jake White, but there is still a lot of rugby to be played and we are certainly not out of the race,” Everitt said.

Ireland coach Joe Schmidt said the entry of South Africa’s big weapons in the second half had delivered an onslaught that the tourists were unable to handle as the Springboks turned a 19-3 halftime deficit into a thrilling 32-26 victory in the second Test at Ellis Park at the weekend.

“We said at halftime that we can’t sit on the lead with the weaponry South Africa have, and that was in full evidence in the second half. They delivered an onslaught that we couldn’t match up to, the result was earned by the Springbok ball-carriers.

“The way the Springboks came back was relatively irrepressible – Damian de Allende is a devastating carrier, Ruan Combrinck is unbelievably tough to put down, once he got the ball in his hands he was a real handful, and Warren Whiteley scored a really well-taken try,” Schmidt said after the game.

Ireland captain Rory Best said his team still believed they could go to Port Elizabeth and win the series in the third Test next weekend.

“Obviously this defeat is very hard to take, for large parts of the first two-thirds of the game we did all the things we talked about – we were physical, we got off the line quickly and we held on to the ball. But we couldn’t defend that lead because once the Springboks started to come around the corner we began to slip tackles. If you don’t compete around the fringes against the Springboks then you’re going to lose.

“But we’ll take this loss on the chin and come out stronger on the other side. We still have a chance to win the Test series and we have to make sure that if we’re in this position again, we don’t make the same errors. We must improve on the last quarter,” hooker Best said.