Ken Borland

Despite all the talk about scoring tries, the Cell C Sharks will be putting their faith in the expertise of their tight five, judging by the team announced yesterday for their opening Vodacom SuperRugby match against the Toyota Cheetahs in Durban on Saturday.

Jannie and Bismarck du Plessis, Tendai Mtawarira, Mouritz Botha and Pieter-Steph du Toit will all be bringing international experience to the field and coach Gary Gold will be hoping they will be laying the most solid of foundations.

Marcell Coetzee is the senior loose forward, with Pumas import Renaldo Bothma getting a SuperRugby debut and Tera Mtembu slotting in at eighthman. Willem Alberts and lock Stephan Lewies are still out with injury.

Pat Lambie and Cobus Reinach form an outstanding halfback pairing, but Gold has a less settled combination at centre. Waylon Murray was born in Durban and schooled at Westville, but has played most of his recent rugby outside the province and he returns to the outside centre berth, with young Heimar Williams alongside him, preferred to exciting young powerhouse Andre Esterhuizen.

SP Marais will be at fullback, but perhaps the Sharks’ greatest attacking threat will be from wings Lwazi Mvovo and S’bura Sithole.

Jean Deysel is on the bench and is the only one of the Japanese-based players to make the match-day squad, with the return of Frans Steyn and JP Pietersen keenly awaited as they will give the backline the experience that is currently lacking in comparison to the tight five.

Matt Stevens, the former British Lions prop, is also on the bench, as is the veteran wing Odwa Ndungane.

The match will be refereed by the Australian, Andrew Lees, and the kick-off is at 5.05pm.

Geoff Boycott certainly would not approve, but the Unlimited Titans took to the field on the first day of domestic action without their captain, Henry Davids, who withdrew from the team for their opening Sunfoil Series match against the bizhub Highveld Lions at the Wanderers on Thursday.

It’s not so much that Davids refused to play, but rather that he felt others deserved selection in the batting line-up ahead of him.

Davids has been dealing with a nasty hand injury in the build-up to the season, but played in both the Global Softech Sixes and the Northerns Bash and batted with freedom.

“Henry’s hand is fine, he’s been batting like a champion in the nets, but he asked that Qaasim Adams be selected ahead of him in the interests of the team and of sending the right message as far as our selection process goes. It was on the basis of last season’s performances and a seriously mature decision for the better of the team,” Titans coach Rob Walter confirmed.

The Momentum One-Day Cup begins on October 10 so perhaps Davids will return then; it would probably not be fair to give Adams just one chance and drop him should he fail. Adams scored three half-centuries last season and was one of only three Titans batsmen to amass more than 300 runs in the four-day competition, while Davids struggled to 275 runs in 14 innings at an average of 19.

Perhaps the Titans were rocked by the withdrawal of their captain, Farhaan Behardien taking the reins, as their bowlers seemed rusty and unfocused after the Lions won the toss and elected to bat first on Thursday.

On a pitch that offered some pace and movement for the quick bowlers, it took the Titans 99 minutes to claim their first wicket, Marchant de Lange winning an lbw decision against Rassie van der Dussen (37), even though the ball appeared to be going over the stumps.

Temba Bavuma then came in and produced a top-class innings of 84 in three hours, off 148 deliveries. A short man, Bavuma was nevertheless quick to come forward and his driving, especially straight and through the covers, was a sheer delight.

A second-wicket partnership of 116 in 41-and-a-half overs with captain Stephen Cook put the Lions in control and they had cruised to 171 for one at tea.

But in the second over after the break, leg-spinner Shaun von Berg produced a delivery that scurried straight on off the pitch, and Cook was adjudged lbw for 56. It was an innings that had spanned four hours and 23 minutes and 174 deliveries, the opener collecting six fours, but there were a number of scratchy, unconvincing strokes along the way.

A team with a quality leg-spinner such as Von Berg should never be discounted and the 28-year-old claimed the key wicket of Bavuma four overs later, beating the beautifully-set batsman with a wonderful googly.

There was a notable lift in the field thanks to Von Berg’s efforts and the next wicket came courtesy of a brilliant run out, Heino Kuhn scoring a direct hit from square-leg to remove Dominic Hendricks for five.

That brought international wicketkeepers Quinton de Kock and Thami Tsolekile together.

Tsolekile, a worker of the ball, was content to play second fiddle to De Kock, who breezed to 51 off 61 balls as 51 was added for the fifth wicket, before losing his off stump to a ferocious yorker from De Lange.

Tsolekile will resume on Friday morning on 19 not out, with Devon Conway on seven, with the Lions having subsided from 174 for one to 271 for five in the face of a determined Titans comeback.

While De Lange’s dismissal of De Kock will live long in the memory, Walter will be delighted that the fast bowler was able to deliver 21 overs for 78 runs, taking two wickets, and generally look to be heading in the right direction in his “second coming”.

Walter will be over the moon, however, with the display of Von Berg, who just seemed to pick up from the strong finish to last season.

It’s normally the fast bowlers who prosper on day one at the Wanderers, but Von Berg was the best bowler on show with two for 61 in 26 overs and, judging by the turn he obtained from the outset, he will be even more of a handful on day three or four.

Walter will be hoping that his pacemen will be targeting the stumps a bit more on the second day in an effort to wrap up the Lions first innings in the morning session.

If anyone ever wanted proof that a new broom sweeps clean in rugby, they need look no further than new Argentina coach Daniel Hourcade’s radically changed team for the opening Rugby Championship clash against South Africa at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday.

Argentina have grown accustomed to fielding different squads depending on the occasion and the sides that played their previous international, against Scotland in Cordoba; their last match of 2013, against Italy in Rome; and their previous Rugby Championship fixture, versus the Wallabies in Rosario; are all very dissimilar.

Only two players that started the 21-19 defeat to Scotland will feature against the Springboks, while there are nine changes and a positional switch to the side that beat Italy 19-14 and only 11 of the 23 that were hammered 54-17 by Australia have survived for the next Rugby Championship engagement.

Players such as the retired midfield star Felipe Contepomi, injured wing Juan Imhoff, hooker Eusebio Guinazu and experienced locks Patricio Albacete and Manuel Carizza are all conspicuous by their absence, but Hourcade struck a defiant tone when announcing the team on Thursday.

“It is a young team without much experience, but they are quality players with a lot of capacity. We believe that we have very good players in this side and we want to give them experience and support them,” Hourcade said.

The new Pumas coach acknowledges that his team are the underdogs against the Springboks, who thrashed them 73-13 a year ago in Soweto, but he believes they can help grow his side.

“South Africa are a great team, with a very good coach and a very strong mentality. They are at the point of ascending.

“But this is an excellent chance for us to build as a team. We’re prepared for what South Africa will bring.

“Last year’s match here we will take as part of our experience, it was down to attitude and it was an important lesson. It was part of the process, we will learn off those results and continue that process,” the 56-year-old said.

One area where Argentina do traditionally boast plenty of firepower is in the scrum and the presence of Leicester Tigers veteran Marcos Ayerza in the number one jersey will certainly pique the interest of Springbok tightheads Jannie du Plessis and Frans Malherbe.

“Argentina are always a big test, but I’m looking forward to it. I haven’t played them before and I haven’t scrummed against them.

“It’s a massive opportunity for me to secure my spot as the back-up tighthead and it’s all up to me to take it, that’s the bottom line. It comes down to my primary role, if I don’t do that well then I won’t be selected, but the goal is to become a more modern forward, with more mobility and ball skills,” Malherbe said.

While Argentina have been understandably conservative in their first two years of Rugby Championship participation, Hourcade says they need to do more with the ball if they are to beat one of the big three.

“When we consider the teams we are playing against, then we have to take risks. If we just play slowly then all we are doing is trying to stop the inevitable ending, we know we will lose.

“We need to move the ball more and play quicker, it does have risks but we assume that risk. We will make some mistakes, but that’s part of the game and the only way to grow this team,” Hourcade said.

Centres Juan-Martin Hernandez and Marcelo Bosch are certainly looking forward to getting their hands on the ball more often.

“For me personally, I prefer to have the ball in my hands rather than having to tackle. I’m happier with the current approach, but we know we are playing against the three best teams in the world and it will be tough.

“There’s a lot of responsibility on us to manage the ball, but first of all we have to obtain the ball. There are steps you have to go through before you can play that style,” outside centre Bosch said.

As positive as the Pumas might want to be, the numbers that matter will be amongst the forwards, in terms of securing first-phase possession, dominating the gain-line and winning turnovers.

A number that may be decisive is  140 – the difference between the 411 Test caps the Springbok pack and five replacements have, compared to the 271 of their counterparts.

Argentina team (caps in brackets): 15-Joaquin Tuculet (11), 14-Horacio Agulla (51), 13-Marcelo Bosch (25), 12-Juan-Martin Hernandez (44), 11-Manuel Montero (13), 10-Nicolas Sanchez (21), 9-Martin Landajo (31), 8-Juan-Manuel Leguizamon (55), 7-Juan-Martin Fernandez Lobbe (56), 6-Pablo Matera (11), 5-Tomas Lavanini (9), 4-Mariano Galarza (18), 3-Ramiro Herrera (2), 2-Agustin Creevy (28), 1-Marcos Ayerza (48). Substitutes – 16-Matias Cortese (7), 17-Lucas Noguera Paz (5), 18-Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro (7), 19-Matias Alemanno (5), 20-Leonardo Senatore (20), 21-Tomas Cubelli (25), 22-Santiago Gonzalez Iglesias (7), 23-Lucas Gonzalez Amorosino (33).