Only the Sharks are looking good thus far

Its extremely concerning that an average Lions side dispatched with the Stormers as they did........Coetzee has his selections all stuffed up......with centres playing wing, one of his best players in Fourie wasted on the bench and a sub standard Argentinian lock brought on board.

Its difficult to pin point exactly what Coetzee and Fleck think they will accomplish with such predictable attacking plans......which are so easy to defend against.......no decoy runners, just plain one on one all day. The sooner the Stormers wake up to how poor Coetzee is as a coach the better. 

de Allende was their best back..........Jean had one moment of the match but then botched the pass...........the forwards did their bit......without any  standouts.

For the Lions, Boshoff had another good game with the boot........another Morne, but with a bit more to him. de Klerk at 9 was good again......he has something about him. Watermeyer at 13 was probably the best SA 13 on the day.

Huge upset with the Lions halfbacks dictating the play.

The Bulls vs Cheetahs game was never going to amount to much given the weather..........Fouche at 10 for the Bulls was once again piss poor. Lood was once again very good at 4 as was Coenie at 3.......I enjoyed the odd sojourn by Serfontein at 12.

The Sharks are looking good under Jake......SP Marais was very good at 15, Mvovo looks full of running and its great to see Frans in domineering form. Lambie was again solid. Beast had a huge game, PSDT was again good and Coetzee is looking more and more like a fetcher as the games go by.

Sharks are on track, the Lions are exceeding expectation and the Cheetahs, Bulls and Stormers need to step up their games in a big way

Mozart

The Sharks does look good and I mentioned SP as a very good full back before.   There are things needed to tweak up in the case of the Sharks and White needs to work on Steyn to up his game and not hog balls - like he did on Saturday.   Also not sure about the loosies.  Alberts have been below par in defence with a missed tackle ratio of 20% - but in his case that is par for the course.

In comments on the Sharksworld  website there is also the question of ball protection - where the Sharks was not very good on Saturday  and the tendency of in particular the loosies to hand onto balls too long.   Must agree with what the members say in that case.

Of the other teams - the Cheetahs had a poor day at the office against the Lions and lost by a whisker.   Naka was very critical about that and this week they pped their game considerably.  They are off to Australasia now and we will have to see how they go on tour before we can really make a judgement in their case.    Last year they lost against the Sharks and subsequently won three of their four matches on tour.   May just happen again this year.

The Stormers were disgustingly poor on Saturday  and the newspapers are screaming murder.  I think Coetzee has gone  dilly with his team selection.   Burger was desperately poor and they will have to get a better player at 7 - afraid that Schalk would not make the grade on Super 15 level.     For the rest Kolisi was very poor and the backline dysfunctional because of the selections.   They should have the center combination as De Allende and De Villiers.   I think that Schreuder is a poor scrummie and Catrakillis looked off the boil on Saturday.   I think that they should change the loosies and move Elstadt to 7, bringing in Rhodes at lock,  I would also play Fourie at 6 and hope that Liebenberg is fit  abd  can cover the hooker position,

The Bulls have a serious flyhalf problem  and also in the case of Basson.  Despite what Saffex says their midfield must also up their game.  Bur for Matfield,  their forwards are OK.  I noticed in both matches played that their tight five was good in scrumming until Matfield came on after which  their performances in that Department deteriorated considerably. 

  j

 Gron

Welcome to the site.   Before the season started I wrote on the site that the Lions may  do better than expected,  They have some very good youngsters and they were lucky that Jantjies was not available for their games thus far and they could play Boshoff who is double the flyhalf Jantjies will ever be.  

I think that the two wins have boosted their confidence and that some NZ and Aussie sides will struggle against them especially at home.   Sides like the Hurricanes, the Highlanders, the Blues, the Rebels and the Force and even stronger ones are not going to get the free party they thought previously  they would,