Ken Borland

Bulls coach Jake White said before their United Rugby Championship match against the Sharks in Durban that he would like his team to move towards the Northern Hemisphere approach of using the set-pieces as more of an attacking platform than as an opportunity to get penalties.

The Sharks clearly did not get the memo though as they thoroughly dominated the Bulls in the scrums, earning eight penalties as well as forcing referee Jaco Peyper to yellow card retreaded tighthead Lizo Gqoboka, and also putting the visitors under pressure in the lineouts. That dominance up front set in motion a commanding display as they swept the Currie Cup champions aside 30-16.

“The set-pieces are always important, especially with the conditions we have in Durban this time of year,” Sharks coach Sean Everitt said. “The set-pieces really functioned well and we got a maul try.

“So it’s been a good turnaround in that department. The scrum is one of three things that have to be in place for you to win, the others being territory and defence.

“We won the territory battle, although we were not as clinical as I would have liked in the first half. Defensively we stopped the Bulls’ momentum, we won the gain-line.

“At the breakdowns we were doing more cleaning next to the ball and not over it, but we got better at it, and in the second half we were able to put the opposition under pressure there,” Everitt said.

White said the Bulls are set to boost their front-row stocks, especially at tighthead prop, given the departure of Trevor Nyakane to Racing 92 in France, and the current unavailability of Jacques van Rooyen and Mornay Smith. The inexperienced Robert Hunt started in the number three jersey and was replaced by Gqoboka, who has not played on that side of the scrum since the start of his career.

“From a personnel point of view, we obviously need to get more experienced tighthead props because there are things in the scrum we have to get right,” White said.

“On our ball, I thought we played quite cleverly, but there was no stopping the Sharks on their ball and that put us under pressure.”

Everitt also gave a big thumbs up to his returning Springboks, who were very much the heartbeat of the side, especially Thomas du Toit and Bongi Mbonambi up front, and Lukhanyo Am at inside centre.

“Having the Boks back made a huge difference and they came through really well. It’s their attitude that was really pleasing.

“I’ve been at the Sharks for a long time and sometimes you worry about the attitude of the Springboks when they come back, but they came back very well prepared and it was a smooth transition.

“Lukhanyo played yet another 80 minutes and was man of the match, while Bongi fitted in seamlessly and did really well today. He was strong defensively and the set-pieces went really well,” Everitt said.

Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber admitted that a lack of dominance by the SA A pack in the set-pieces and the gainline battle concerned him after their shock 17-14 defeat at the hands of the Bulls in Cape Town on Saturday.

The Bulls fielded a young pack with only three experienced players in captain and flank Nizaam Carr, prop Jacques van Rooyen and replacement loose forward Arno Botha. But they matched the SA A team blow-for-blow and their lineout dominance was especially damaging to the opposition’s cause.

The Bulls played with great passion and physicality, and Nienaber admitted that they simply wanted to win the match more than his charges. And that is a damning assessment a week away from the first Test.

“Yes, I definitely expected a better performance from the pack, especially better ball from the set-pieces. We didn’t get a proper platform to launch our attacks from. The Bulls are the best franchise in South Africa and hats off to them. Obviously their desperation levels were through the roof. The first fingers point at myself and management because we obviously did things wrong in the build-up.

“Sad to say, but the Bulls were more desperate than us. And that’s even though there are places up for grabs in the Test team, but you can’t take a lot of positives from a performance like that, except that we got game time into a lot of guys who needed it. I’m quite emotional after a performance like that, as a team the performance was just not there,” Nienaber admitted after the game.

The Springbok coach did not want to discuss individual performances, but suffice to say he probably thinks his gran could have played with more intensity and fire than some of the SA A team.

“Any comments I make about individuals will be emotional. Maybe some individuals did well, but it did not come out as a team. But we got a lot of answers over certain players, we needed questions asked of them under pressure. Which is exactly what we wanted, but not the loss, that’s not what we hoped for,” Nienaber said.

Scrumhalf Cobus Reinach, eighthman Kwagga Smith, fullack Aphelele Fassi and solid flyhalf Elton Jantjies were probably the only players to have advanced their Springbok cause.

The return of tighthead prop Thomas du Toit to the Sharks line-up and the absence of loosehead Steven Kitshoff for Western Province will be an obvious shift in the fortunes of the two teams for the Currie Cup semi-final at Newlands on Saturday, but Sharks coach Sean Everitt said on Thursday that it is what happens after the set-pieces that is of more importance than the scrum or lineout itself.

Everitt was able to choose both his Springbok props in Du Toit and Ox Nche on Thursday, while Kitshoff, South Africa’s No.1 loosehead and one of the world’s best in that position, was ruled out of the semi-final due to Covid-19 protocols.

“Even if you get set-piece dominance, what happens next is the important thing. After a dominant scrum or lineout is does make getting the gainline advantage easier, but the set-pieces are just a platform to play from. There are lot of other aspects that have to take place to get points on the board. But it will be good to have Thomas back after he was out for quite a while with Covid problems and injury before that.

“The set-piece battle is about the unit though and although Kitshoff is one of the best and exceptionally fit, Ali Vermaak is a good player as well and Western Province still have Frans Malherbe, Bongi Mbonambi, JD Schickerling and Salmaan Moerat so it is a formidable tight five. So we certainly cannot take it easier and we are never happy when someone falls sick,” Everitt said on Thursday.

While Everitt had the full complement of players to choose from, the Sharks’ tight five does show a couple of changes from the outfit that would have been considered the first-choice selection a few weeks ago. The selections of Fez Mbatha to start at hooker and JJ van der Mescht at lock point to the KwaZulu-Natalians bulking up the scrum to counter Western Province’s key strength.

“Fez Mbatha went really well against Griquas and made the scrum stronger; Dan Jooste was struggling wit an eye injury last week and we actually weren’t sure whether he’d be fit this weekend, so he will start off the bench. JJ van der Mescht is purely picked on merit, he had one of his best performances against Griquas and Hyron Andrews hasn’t played for a while so we didn’t feel his body could last the whole 80 minutes.

“One would obviously like the continuity of playing every weekend and picking the same players, but we are level-pegging in that regard with the other three teams in the semi-finals. It’s all about how you train and the quality of your preparation. It’s a bit like the first game of the season, we all worry about how we’re going to go. But we’re on an equal footing with Western Province, it’s not as if they’ve been playing either,” Everitt said.

Sharks: Aphelele Fassi, Sbu Nkosi, Lukhanyo Am (c), Marius Louw, Yaw Penxe, Curwin Bosch, Sanele Nohamba, Sikhumbuzo Notshe, Henco Venter, Dylan Richardson, Ruben van Heerden, JJ van der Mescht, Thomas du Toit, Fezokuhle Mbatha, Ox Nche. Bench – Dan Jooste, Mzamo Majola, Michael Kumbirai, Hyron Andrews, Thembelani Bholi, Jaden Hendrikse, Jeremy Ward, Manie Libbok.

Last weekend’s South African Conference SuperRugby matches just showed that the old adage of your tight five forwards winning you games remains as true as ever. For all the work we want them to do around the field these days, the set-pieces remain what teams build on.

It seems a player in the tight five’s mindset just goes if they are going backwards and are under pressure in the set-pieces and the difference between the Stormers and the Bulls in Cape Town was basically the scrums, and it was that same scrum that won Western Province the Currie Cup final last year.

Wilco Louw played his rugby as a junior at the Bulls – how and why did they let him go?! – and he is a monster who just does not get shifted at tighthead. He is certainly number one in that position in South Africa at the moment.

To have 30 000 people in at Newlands for the derby was a real positive and the Stormers were supercharged. You could just see the emotion of Robbie Fleck in the coaches’ box, he obviously knew the importance of the game, and the way a team plays is a reflection of their coaching and the Stormers were protecting a very proud recent record against the Bulls at Newlands, having won every game between them there for the last seven years.

The pressure won’t go away for the Stormers with that impressive win, but they have given themselves a chance of qualifying for the playoffs. It will now be about replicating that performance for the rest of the competition.

You have to give credit to the Stormers for the way they played, but they need a performance like that every week now. They will be a bit disappointed not to get the bonus point, they needed that because there’s not much difference between the teams on the log. Bonus points will more than likely settle matters, they are always so vital in the middle of the table, they make all the difference.

The Bulls did really well to stick in the contest, but the game hinged when the Stormers got the kickoff back straight after the Bulls went ahead 17-12 early in the second half, and scored a try to go back into the lead.

The Bulls will take away from the game that they managed to get back into contention having really been through the mincer in the first 15 minutes.

We also need to celebrate the Sharks doing so well against the New Zealand teams and they have scored an amazing number of tries against them – six against the Blues, four versus the Hurricanes and now five against the Highlanders – so they are clearly playing really good rugby. Maybe they have discovered the secret of how to play against the Kiwis, and they are certainly outscoring them, so credit to the Sharks.

Their approach has brought them reward and now they just need to look for consistency.

Some of the Sharks tries have been absolutely superb in terms of passing and clever box-kicks and to see a lock in Ruan Botha claiming the ball as the first chaser, leading to their first try against the Highlanders in the opening minute was amazing. They also scored a great try with the bridge pass over the top and another through a sublime grubber from Robert du Preez, which are all the ways to expose the wing.

The three Du Preez brothers certainly make a massive difference to the Sharks team, with the two loose forwards monstering the gain-line and Robert really controlling the game at flyhalf. It’s great to see in terms of the Springboks with Handre Pollard also playing well too, both Handre and Robert are big flyhalves who really defend their channels.

The Lions are almost indestructible on the Highveld and in South Africa in general, they’re bulletproof playing in South Africa having not lost to another local franchise in three years, but they really need to get something out of their game against the Highlanders in Dunedin this weekend. If they do then maybe they can still get a home semi-final because the Australian teams are so far behind. The Lions will be confident they can beat anyone on the Highveld and nobody will want to travel to altitude to play them, then a final away from home can always be 50/50.

The Jaguares have really improved and are in quarterfinal contention, they have a lot of home games coming up after their amazing run of winning four games on the bounce away from home. They seem to have returned to the traditional Argentinian values of a good scrum and maul.

For the Lions, Ruan Combrinck did not have the greatest game in defence, he went way too high twice and was too easily brushed off, which really cost them, and the Lions’ defence was too narrow and the Hurricanes were able to score a try by going around them inside the 22. They need better spacing there.

The Lions have kept themselves in the race to win the Conference though and they could well be in Johannesburg for the playoffs. If they are to be at home in the knockout rounds then they have to ensure that they are more accurate in the set-pieces; they lost a lineout which led directly to the Hurricanes getting seven points.

For the Wellingtonians, Ben Lam is certainly on fire … and New Zealand have just uncovered another top-class winger!

The Springbok pack is showing great potential too.

If Steven Kitshoff, Beast Mtawarira, Wilco Louw and Trevor Nyakane can replicate their performances in SuperRugby, along with the hookers we have in Adriaan Strauss, who had a huge weight on his shoulders in 2016 and is now playing with freedom, Malcolm Marx and Bismarck du Plessis, then South Africa will have a heck of a front row.

When you add in locks Lood de Jager, RG Snyman, Pieter-Steph du Toit and Franco Mostert, and Eben Etzebeth when he is fit, then we have the makings of a really good Springbok tight five. They tick all the set-piece boxes and that is still the basis of all rugby, never mind Test rugby, for all the skills people are dazzled by.

Plus I’m sure Rassie Erasmus will want to get Vincent Koch in the mix, but will he play in June at the end of a long season in England? Maybe it would be better to give him some time off before the Rugby Championship. Heyneke Meyer had a theory that it was better to play the SuperRugby guys in June and the overseas players at the end of the year, because playing all-year-round rugby is very tough.

In terms of the back row, a combination of Duane Vermeulen, Francois Louw and Jean-Luc du Preez looks really good, and then you put Siya Kolisi in the mix as well. He was superb last June – forcing turnovers, being busy around the field, chasing down kicks and making strong carries.Congratulations to him on captaining the Stormers so well in his 100th game at his beloved Newlands.

John McFarland is the assistant coach of the Kubota Spears in Japan and was the Springbok defence coach from 2012 through to the 2015 World Cup, where they conceded the least line-breaks in the tournament and an average of just one try per game. Before that, McFarland won three SuperRugby titles (2007, 09, 10) with the Bulls and five Currie Cup crowns with the Blue Bulls. In all, he won 28 trophies during his 12 years at Loftus Versfeld.