Ken Borland

A new-look Titans batting line-up for the Momentum One-Day Cup will allow them to give wicketkeeper Mangaliso Mosehle more exposure with the bat, stand-in captain Henry Davids has confirmed.

Mosehle has almost always batted around the number seven position for the Titans, but scored just 99 runs at an average of 24.75 last season.

“Mangi will have a new role this season, he’s showing a bit more form already after not having a great season last year. He’s going to bat in the top three or four because he’s an explosive batsman and one of the sweetest hitters of the ball. I often stand in awe of him when I bat next to him in the nets because he’s a small guy but he hits the ball so hard.

“He hasn’t had the chance to really showcase that talent down the order, it’s difficult batting down there and being expected to finish the innings. If you don’t come off in two or three games, you start worrying about it and he’ll have more opportunity this season,” Davids said.

The Titans are the defending champions and, even though they will start the competition without half-a-dozen players on tour with the Proteas in India, Davids said they have several players to keep an eye on this season.

“Theunis de Bruyn is mentally very strong, he showed that by scoring a double-hundred on debut for SA A, he handles himself very well and he’s very mature. Heinrich Klaasen is also a very good cricketer and Aiden Markram is waiting in the wings as well.

“In terms of bowlers, you have to take wickets up front because all teams have great hitters in the middle-order and if you give them a good platform then they’ll really hurt you. Marchant de Lange is a quality strike bowler and Junior Dala did really well last season as well. Ethy Mbhalati is still hungry to do well and he came back very strong at the back end of last season. You need experienced bowlers and he’s been the most successful Titans bowler ever,” Davids pointed out.

The Titans get the competition and new season underway on Friday when they host the Warriors at SuperSport Park in Centurion and they will be eyeing a good start to the competition, unlike in the last two seasons when they have scraped into the knockout rounds with incredible winning runs.

“We’ve tended to start slow, but we want to hit the ground running this season and not have to win five-in-a-row like in previous campaigns. We know we can play under pressure, but I think we can expect a lot more from the side if we can play with freedom,” Davids said.

There was more relief than elation for Cell C Sharks coach Gary Gold after his team bounced back from an opening loss to secure an impressive bonus-point win over the Emirates Lions  in their weekend SuperRugby match at Kings Park.

“I think relief is the word, it’s certainly not a big celebration. It’s such early days now, you can throw all these cliches around and say you move on from a loss like last week. But you don’t really move on from a loss like that. It was disappointing and really it was our own fault.

“We didn’t perform well enough last week, so it was weighing heavily on our minds. That’s the psychological challenge you have as a coach, it’s hopefully to give the players confidence that they’re good enough and they can come back from something like that,” Gold said after the Sharks’ 29-12 triumph.

The scrum was the outstanding facet of play for the Sharks, with the Du Plessis brothers, Jannie and Bismarck, showing their class and being ably assisted by loosehead Dale Chadwick as the highly-rated Lions set-piece was dismantled.

Lions coach Johan Ackermann pinpointed Bismarck du Plessis’ return at hooker for the dramatic improvement in the Sharks scrum.

“Bismarck made the big difference there,” said Ackermann. “He outsmarted our young front row and was exceptional. Those scrum penalties against us were very disappointing, we are far better than that, but credit must go to the Sharks.”

For the Sharks to score four tries in sodden conditions that almost saw the game postponed was also highly impressive and Gold admitted it was far more than he had hoped for.

“I didn’t ever imagine we would score four tries in those conditions, but I’m very grateful it did end up that way. I thought we managed the game well to be able to keep the momentum that got us to those opportunities that led to the tries.

“I was happy with the urgency and the general play all round. So I’m very proud of the performance,” Gold said.

The former Springbok forwards coach also praised Bismarck du Plessis for his display, especially since his shoulder is still troubling him.

“His presence was a factor, there’s no doubt about it, because we know what a world-class player he is for so many reasons. He threw into the lineouts particularly well today, he led the team well and obviously he stabilised our scrum,” Gold said.

Other high points for the Sharks were the burgeoning relationship between halfbacks Pat Lambie and Cobus Reinach, which looked a marriage made in heaven in conditions in which their tactical play was always going to be vital.

Lambie made liberal use of the crosskick to set up two of the Sharks’ tries, while opposite number Marnitz Boshoff failed to adapt his game-plan to the wet conditions, and the superb displays of the Du Plessis brothers, lock Pieter-Steph du Toit, Reinach and Lambie are surely not going to go unnoticed by Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer with the World Cup in the northern hemisphere later this year.

Legendary Springbok flyhalf Naas Botha says he is concerned that he is not seeing Handre Pollard empowered with more decision-making responsibility in the Springbok team ahead of the World Cup.

While Botha said he was encouraged by the style of play produced by the Springboks in the last two weeks against Australia and New Zealand, both games were ultimately lost and he said better decision-making would have avoided the final-quarter fade-outs.

At the start of the final quarter against the All Blacks, South Africa laid siege to the try-line against 14 men and yet couldn’t score, with Damian de Allende, who had spent the whole match bumping tacklers off, standing unused in the backline.

“We saw that we have enough talent last weekend, but we couldn’t get over the final hurdle in the last two games. The performance against the All Blacks was totally different to what we’ve seen over the last few years, but it should have happened two years ago. Under pressure, we just need to calm down, especially in the last 10 minutes.

“But I feel strongly that the flyhalf should be empowered more. In that crucial period when we just couldn’t cross their tryline, he should make the call to change the game plan because just going to the forwards wasn’t working. But too often the ball is not going to a decision-maker, in that zone you just need to relax and allow someone to take the lead and 99% of the time that should be the flyhalf,” Botha said on Wednesday at the launch of Creative Rugby, a book he has collaborated on with Dr Kobus Neethling, an expert in the field of creative behaviour.

“Handre is a fantastic player, the Bulls’ season hurt him in terms of his confidence, but we saw last weekend that he’s getting that back, his play was good. We’re fortunate to have him, but I’d like to see him take more control. Instead of the scrumhalves kicking up-and-unders from our 22, the ball should go to him to kick long because you don’t want to play in your own half,” Botha added.

The undisputed king of flyhalf play in the 1980s said if South African rugby in general could start thinking creatively rather than going “overboard on game plans”, then the Springboks would once again be world-beaters.

“The All Blacks scored a creative try to win the Test, that 74^th-minute lineout has to be called creative, and the first thing we do is question the legality with Law such-and-such. All international players are equally strong and fast these days, what makes you better then is what you have between the ears. Our players just need to play what is in front of them more.

“We need to think differently. In South Africa, if a team wins they say it’s because they stuck to the game plan, then if they lose it’s because they didn’t stick to the game plan. But great players become bad players because of game plans. You can’t just rock up without a plan, but that should just be a guide, we tend to go overboard on game plans.

“Five years later we’re still doing what worked before, we’re stuck while everybody else has moved on. We have to start thinking differently and think outside the box,” Botha said.