Ken Borland

South African rugby teams have put the SuperRugby epoch behind them and, now that they have tasted the Champions Cup tournament, are ready to fully embrace European competition, even when it takes a team like the Sharks from the subtropical summer heat of Durban one week into the icy winter of the hilly Bordeaux region the next.

The Sharks, having marked their Champions Cup debut with an impressive 39-31 win over Harlequins at Kings Park, now take on Bordeaux Begles at the Chaban Delmas Stadium on Friday night.

“It definitely met expectations and all the hype playing against Harlequins and we made a good start, even though there was a lot for us to improve on,” hooker Bongi Mbonambi said on Tuesday from France.

“And now we take on top French players at home in front of their own crowd. The big difference is we just came from 31° in Durban to 2° at the moment and it might be zero on Friday night.

“It’s a totally different kind of cold, but we are here to make memories and make sure we are totally prepared. We’re looking forward to the challenge.

“The massive learning from the Quins game was that we can never relax, these are very good teams in this competition. They’ve been playing European Cup for longer than us, and we still have a lot to learn.

“We have to embrace it, you can’t always have home advantage. But even in tough conditions and with a hostile crowd, some of us enjoy it, it’s like what we face in international rugby. Hopefully we can teach the other players to embrace it too,” Mbonambi said.

Bordeaux lost their opening Champions Cup match away to Gloucester 22-17 in a photo finish, but the fact they were 17-5 up in the final quarter will have them extra motivated to inflict some real damage on the Sharks this weekend at home.

Bordeaux have a powerful pack and a punchy backline, and the fact that their halfbacks, scrummie Maxime Lucu and pivot Matthieu Jalibert, both played off the bench against the Springboks last month, steering France to victory, is a graphic illustration of the sort of quality the Sharks are up against.

“The French teams always hurt after losing in the Champions Cup and Bordeaux have a really good squad,” Mbonambi acknowledged. “They slipped up last weekend, so this Friday will be really tough.

“They have great loose forwards and their halfbacks played in the Test, they are really good at running the whole place, they control things.

“Their pack will definitely put our attacking breakdown under pressure and we can’t let their big forwards run at us,” Mbonambi said.

The Sharks are following the manual on how to retreat into a laager to the letter this week as they head into their United Rugby Championship match against the Ospreys in Durban on Friday night refusing to discuss the firing of their head coach Sean Everitt or the fact that Siya Kolisi is injured.

Whether this is all an air of denial or one of defiance will only be seen on Friday night against an Ospreys side who gave the high-flying Bulls a tough second half at Loftus Versfeld last weekend.

Everitt had been at the Sharks for more than a decade and was a popular figure; since new director of rugby Neil Powell has arrived at Kings Park they have put in a flat performance against the Bulls and a horror show against Cardiff. But Powell has now officially taken over the coaching of the team.

The former Springbok Sevens supremo said on Thursday that he is satisfied that the team is behind him.

“Obviously it has not been an easy week, but it was important to get the whole squad of fifty together. We are all part of it and we’ve got to make it better. Our goals are still the same.

“It was important to discuss that and we’ve got buy-in already from the players. A lot has been said, but we can speak as much as we like, it’s time now for action.

“That’s where Siya and Eben Etzebeth have made a massive contribution for us this week as well, they were at every session and meeting, refocusing us on the job at hand.

“We will keep chipping away and moving in the right direction until we get success in terms of the focus and mindset,” Powell said, before revealing that Kolisi was unavailable for selection due to injury, while Etzaebeth is being rested.

When asked for more details of Kolisi’s injury, Powell said he was unable to say more.

But fellow Springboks Ox Nche and Bongi Mbonambi will bring their strength to the front row, while Vincent Tshituka has moved from the back row to lock, where Powell will hope he can ford the gainline with success.

Both regular eighthmen, Phepsi Buthelezi and Sikhumbuzo Notshe, are in the loose trio, along with the combative Jeandre Labuschagne.

Perhaps the most significant selection though is that of Curwin Bosch, back at flyhalf and being relied upon to lead the team into the right areas on the field.

“It’s important to try and maximize our pack and Vincent can make a massive contribution at No.4,” Powell explained. “And it does not make sense playing either Sikhumbuzo or Phepsi, you want your best players on the field.

“We’re looking to Curwin to manage the game from a kicking perspective, make sure we’re playing in the opposition half by getting on top of the kicking game. We want our flyhalf to manage the game better in terms of kicking and communication,” Powell said.

Sharks – Boeta Chamberlain, Marnus Potgieter, Francois Venter, Ben Tapuai, Makazole Mapimpi, Curwin Bosch, Jaden Hendrikse, Phepsi Buthelezi (c), Jeandre Labuschagne, Sikhumbuzo Notshe, Gerbrandt Grobler, Vincent Tshituka, Carlu Sadie, Bongi Mbonambi, Ox Nche. Bench: Dan Jooste, Ntuthuko Mchunu, Khutha Mchunu, Hyron Andrews, James Venter, Grant Williams, Nevaldo Fleurs, Rohan Janse van Rensburg.

All is not well in The Shark Tank down in Durban, with the sudden sacking of head coach Sean Everitt, as inevitable as it was, highlighting the pressures that come with having major outside investors.

Everitt is a coach who has grown up in Sharks rugby and they were a final-minute drop goal away from contesting the semi-finals of the United Rugby Championship last season.

But as soon as former Springbok Sevens coach Neil Powell was brought in as director of rugby, it became inevitable that one of them would have to go, and the man with the lesser profile, but the greater institutional knowledge, was always going to be the most vulnerable.

Especially since the Board has shown they have an infatuation with big names, which does not always work when one is trying to put together a winning rugby team. So many of those Springbok stars have only been able to play in patches for the Sharks. It is often, as the Stormers and Bulls have shown, what lies in reserve that determines whether the trophy sits in your cabinet at the end of the season.

Powell was initially signed as the defence coach, but when he was suddenly, and without much clarity, elevated to the position of Director of Rugby, Everitt would have known he was in trouble. The talk in Durban is that it was at the insistence of the American investors.

For those with short memories, Everitt had taken the Sharks to the top of the Super Rugby log, after their overseas tour, when Covid struck in 2020. The lucrative equity deal was signed during the pandemic and the culture and vibrant counter-attacking style that Everitt had been building (similar to John Dobson’s success at the Stormers) began to change.

But before Powell’s arrival, the Sharks had given Leinster a memorable battle in Dublin and then produced an outstanding home win over Glasgow Warriors that lifted them to fourth on the log.

Powell then became the face of the team, in charge of selection and apparently very hands-on in terms of coaching.

The Sharks were then flat in going down to the Bulls in Pretoria, followed by last weekend’s traumatic performance against Cardiff, the worst at Kings Park in a very long time and the first time in 50 years the KZN team have not scored a point at home.

One wonders whether Everitt is, in fact, the right scapegoat?

There was a twist last weekend on the old joke about where do the Sharks team stay when they play Free State in Bloemfontein (Answer: With their family) when the Cheetahs visited Durban for a friendly match, but the goal was very serious – making sure they are ready to fire when they return to United Rugby Championship action against the Cardiff Blues at Kings Park on Sunday.

The Sharks last played on October 30 in a disappointing defeat to the Bulls in Pretoria, which leaves them eighth on the log, so it is important they hit the ground running and maintain their five-match unbeaten home run against a tough and highly capable Cardiff team.

“Three weeks off without being in a game situation would maybe have caused us to be rusty this weekend, but fortunately we were able to organise a friendly against the Cheetahs,” director of rugby Neil Powell explained on Friday.

“It was a very good exercise, playing three halves of 30 minutes each, with full-out contact. A guy like Lionel Cronje, who could move into flyhalf on Sunday, was able to get some game-time, as did other guys who have not played a lot.

“Hopefully that means we have more flow and momentum on Sunday and we have to make sure we are up and ready against a really good, quality Cardiff team, who are defensively very strong and have lots of experience.

“We will have to make sure we manage our game well and are very disciplined, because Cardiff score the majority of their tries from the lineout and maul and we can’t be giving penalties away,” Powell said.

The new head honcho at Kings Park acknowledged that the Sharks always seem to be well-prepared for games but then for some reason don’t deliver the same clinical execution come match day. It is something they have identified as needing to be put right so they do not suffer two defeats in a row.

“The whole week we prepared so well for the Bulls but it did not carry over on to the field on match day. So the big focus is that: Carrying what we have done in our training sessions on to the playing field.

“We need the same effort, execution and consistency. I believe it’s a focus thing and we need to get the individual roles right in the structure.

“That wasn’t great against the Bulls, for some reason we didn’t focus enough on getting those basics done. We need to be present in the moment and firstly, understand all our roles and responsibilities,” Powell said.

Sharks: Anthony Volmink, Marnus Potgieter, Francois Venter, Rohan Janse van Rensburg, Werner Kok, Boeta Chamberlain, Cameron Wright, Sikhumbuzo Notshe, Vincent Tshituka,

James Venter (CAPT), Gerbrandt Grobler, Justin Basson, Carlu Sadie, Kerron van Vuuren, Dian Bleuler. Bench – Dan Jooste, Khwezi Mona, Khutha Mchunu, Hyron Andrews, Phepsi Buthelezi, Bradley Davids, Lionel Cronje, Ben Tapuai.