Ken Borland

The Bulls pack may well have come of age in their 17-13 victory over the Stormers in their SuperRugby match at Loftus Versfeld at the weekend, with coach Nollis Marais rating it as their best performance of the season.

The Bulls dominated the scrums, constantly hassled the Stormers’ lineout and were absolutely immense in defending the gainline, all this against a pack with half-a-dozen Springboks including Pieter-Steph du Toit and Eben Etzebeth in the engine room.

“I think it was our best performance, especially after our big defeat to them in the first round. We are so young up front, but the guys manned up well. Jannes Kirsten has been good all season – sometimes I think he’s confused as to just how good he is, RG Snyman and Jason Jenkins were playing against guys that are going to the Springbok squad and they really kept them on their toes. They showcased how good they are tonight and all credit to them because they came out and played in a high-pressure match against a team that was very hard off the line,” Marais said.

Having lost the gainline battle in their two previous games against the Brumbies and Waratahs, Marais said his team had learnt how quickly one needs to come off the line in SuperRugby.

“The big thing against the Brumbies and the Waratahs was that we gave them the gainline. They came hard off the line at us and we learnt and showed better speed in defence today. You need a good attack and defence to win and all credit to coach Pine Pienaar for the defence tonight,” Marais said.

Stormers coach Robbie Fleck also praised the redoubled efforts of the Bulls’ defensive line.

“You have to give credit to the Bulls’ defence, they worked incredibly hard. We were retaining possession so they were under pressure, but they did incredibly well, slowing us down at the ruck so we never had any quick ball and we couldn’t raise the tempo.

“They brought us down to their pace, which didn’t suit us, it became a set-piece battle, which we didn’t want. We wanted a quick, open game. But you also have to credit the Bulls’ set-pieces – they contested and had our lineout under pressure, so we couldn’t launch from there, and they won penalties at scrum-time. You need to dominate the set-piece in a tight game,” Fleck said.

Bulls captain Adriaan Strauss says his pack are going to have to produce another mighty display if they are to beat the Brumbies in Canberra on Friday in the second game of their SuperRugby tour.

The Brumbies will have their all-Wallaby front row of Stephen Moore, Ben Alexander and Scott Sio back, while they possess two tremendous loose forwards in David Pocock and Scott Fardy.

“Their pack is definitely one of their strengths so it’s going to be a massive challenge for us,” Strauss agreed. “The Brumbies have got an excellent lineout and scrum, they have a very strong maul and their first-phase play is exceptional.

“It will be tough for us, but I’m very proud of our pack, they’ve really put up their hands and we have to do it again against the Brumbies.”

Strauss, as captain, can’t just focus on the forward battle though and, in terms of tactics, he hopes the Bulls can get the balance right between attack and defence, territory and possession, as they did last weekend against the Force.

“At stages we’ve played some great rugby and we want to play an all-round game and do it for 80 minutes. We want more artillery than just being a one-dimensional team, we want to be great at counter-attack and in the set-pieces, it’s all about playing decision-making rugby,” Strauss said.

The Brumbies will be desperate to get back on the winning trail after losing four of their last six games, including two in a row against the Crusaders and Highlanders. They are currently sixth in the Australasian Conference, two points behind the Rebels.

The Waratahs are level with the Brumbies on 21 points, but have a game in hand and are getting some good momentum after two successive wins.

The current Bulls squad seems to have the potential to grow into mighty oaks, but at the moment their young, inexperienced pack could be likened to a bonsai, which is probably why coach Nollis Marais on Monday announced former Springbok eighthman Anton Leonard as one of his assistant coaches.

Leonard, who captained the Bulls at the beginning of the century as they began their climb out of the mire, will be the forwards coach having impressed Marais with his work with the South-Western Districts pack.

“I’ve been speaking to Anton for a while and he’s done excellent work with South-Western Districts, they almost beat the Lions in the Vodacom Cup to make the semi-finals. He’s the best forwards coach currently available and he’s very experienced. How many Super Rugby games has he played, he knows the Bulls’ tradition, he knows about the travel and our culture.

“He told me he wants to make the Bulls proud again and get the old values back. The players look up to him and he agrees with me that rugby has changed and we have to change our style of play. But to do that we have to have a platform up front, and Western Province showed where we need to improve by putting us under pressure in the set-pieces,” Marais told The Citizen.

David Manual, who has done brilliant work with this year’s Currie Cup squad, will be the backline coach, while Gary Botha (scrums & breakdowns) and Pine Pienaar (defence) will work with all Bulls teams as specialist coaches.

Hendre’ Marnitz, who replaced Marais as Blue Bulls U21 coach when he was promoted to the senior team, has also been confirmed as next year’s Currie Cup coach.

After eight years of service, Org Strauss has resigned as the team doctor and will be replaced by Herman Rossouw.

Blue Bulls hooker Bandise Maku knows that how the pack responds to the pressure the powerful Western Province forwards will put them under will go a long way to deciding who wins their Currie Cup semi-final at Loftus Versfeld on Friday.

Western Province will come to Pretoria with a SuperRugby-strength team featuring a powerful front row of Steven Kitshoff, Bongi Mbonambi and Wilco Louw, and two of the best young locks in the country in Ruan Botha and Jean Kleyn, while the combative Nizaam Carr, the intimidating Rynhardt Elstadt and the pacy Sikhumbuzo Notshe form a superbly well-balanced loose trio.

“As a pack, we’ve gone quite well and guys like Pierre Schoeman, Marvin Orie and RG Snyman have come through well. But Western Province have a very good set-piece and are strong on the drive as well, so we’re expecting a big clash up front. Myself, Deon Stegmann, Lappies Labuschagne and Arno Botha have the experience, we need to stay level-headed because there’s always going to be pressure in a semi-final. It’s how you react to it that’s crucial and the set-piece battle is going to be very important, lineouts and defending the drive as well,” Maku told The Citizen on Tuesday.

Western Province, with Kitshoff at the forefront, will no doubt see the Blue Bulls scrum as a potential area of weakness, but Maku said they have improved since being worked over in Cape Town a month ago when the Blue Bulls were beaten 29-14.

“It’s important to get the combinations right up front and we’ve been doing quite well in the scrums lately. It’s still a work in progress, it’s long-term, but we have improved. There’s been a change in personnel and now we want to scrum, plus we have Werner Kruger coming off the bench to add his experience,” Maku said.

The 29-year-old Springbok is one of the most experienced players in the Blue Bulls team with 74 Currie Cup and 53 SuperRugby caps, and he sees taking whatever points are on offer as being the key factor in whether they reach their first final since 2010.

“It’s all about taking your chances. If you have a lineout five metres out, then you have to make it count. You need to take your points so you create scoreboard pressure, so you also have to kick very well, kick when you have to and keep the pressure on them with the boot. We’ll also need to play with more discipline because that will put pressure on them as well,” Maku said.