I a going for the sharks. But this bulle side looks very solid. On paper they are not abad side at all. Of course they are playing away so Sharks benefit from that.
Ex Suerpersport
Jake White spoke earlier in the week about the lengths to which he has gone to embrace the summer humidity as an ally in the forthcoming Vodacom Super Rugby season, but it could well be that the conditions will be the biggest obstacle to the resounding start he is hoping for from his Cell C Sharks team.
Wet weather is always regarded as a leveler, and while Friday dawned hot and humid with not much hint of any rain in Durban, with the forecasters predicting another scorcher for match day, the humidity has the same impact on handling that a torrential downpour would.
Players often complain about how within a few minutes of a match starting in Durban in February or March, they are drenched with sweat. That moisture quickly covers the ball, turning it into something that resembles a cake of soap. That is why those who understand the game and who have watched the Sharks over a long period of time should not be expecting to go to Growthpoint Kings Park anticipating a rousing spectacle of running rugby.
Though it is a nice thought to think that the season could start off with the sort of free-flowing game that we saw when the Highlanders hosted the Chiefs at the start of the 2013 edition of the competition, it is more likely the match will be a stop-start, scrappy affair with little aesthetic value, a bit like the derby between the Sharks and Stormers here just under 12 months ago.
Back then the Sharks scraped a win in a low scoring game in which little appeared to happen, and White, who acknowledged during the week that the humidity would have a big effect on how his team wants to play, would be happy with that on Saturday.
This is a game that, in terms of the hype and importance it is being given in KZN, is being approached almost as if it is a final.
That is because the stakes are high for the Sharks. Understandably, there has been a lot made in the off-season of the new start the franchise is making, with new faces in the chief executive’s office as well as in the building adjacent to the stadium where the coaches go about the daily business of strategizing and preparing.
White said not long after his arrival that his team would win Super Rugby, and that expectation has gathered momentum. With new boss John Smit’s main objective being to get bums back onto the Kings Park seats in a way that hasn’t been seen since his early days as a player, it is imperative that the hype gets matched by on-field substance so that the turnstiles start clicking again.
While of course an opening defeat is something that the Sharks would be able to recover from as Super Rugby is these days such a long competition, such a result could have a severe impact on both the morale of the Sharks players and their supporters.
For the players it would be so because they have spent the off-season getting used to yet another new strategy and coach after having already made the switch from John Plumtree to Brendan Venter last August. Under Venter they were told that they should have lives outside of rugby and that they should grow as human beings; White has told them that they are professional rugby players and have no life outside of rugby.
They report for work each day at 7am and only knock off at around 6pm. That might sound like an honest day at the office for most people, but it is a quite different culture to what the players are used to. It will be used as a reason if the Sharks are successful. As captain Bismarck du Plessis has said, the sacrifice will be worth it if the hard work pays off with a Super Rugby title in early August.
But if the benefits of the hard work are not immediately apparent and the Sharks start off with a hiccup, it could place massive strain on White, who unlike when he was at the Brumbies, has an inexperienced middle-management working for him at his new franchise.
When it comes to the fans, a defeat will explode the bubble of the hype that has carried through since the unexpected victory in Cape Town in the Currie Cup semifinal, and for some it would all amount to false promise. The Stormers experienced it last year when they opened with a defeat to the Bulls in Pretoria.
On paper, the Sharks should easily dispense with the Bulls, who are in a rebuilding phase after losing several top players since last year’s tournament. Players such as Morne Steyn are not easily replaceable, and the injury that has ruled out Arno Botha was a significant setback.
But if there is one area where the Bulls are always consistently good, it is their kicking game, and that is an aspect of play where they could just get an edge on the Sharks on Saturday. And in what is effectively a wet weather game, which is likely to be low scoring, it is not completely beyond the realms of possibility that their kick and chase could win it for them (Really cant see why bulle edge sharks re kicking game!).
So while the Sharks do start as favourites, and it is right for them to expect to win, the game could be evened out by the conditions, making the result more of a lottery than you would expect it to be if you paid heed to the hype that has surrounded the Sharks’ build-up to the new season.
TEAMS
Cell C Sharks:15. SP Marais, 14.Odwa Ndungane, 13.Paul Jordaan, 12.Frans Steyn, 11.Lwazi Mvovo, 10.Patrick Lambie, 9.Cobus Reinach, 8.Ryan Kankowski, 7.Willem Alberts, 6.Marcell Coetzee, 5.Pieter-Steph du Toit, 4.Anton Bresler, 3.Jannie du Plessis, 2.Bismarck du Plessis (captain), 1.Beast Mtawarira.
Replacements: 16.Kyle Cooper, 17.Dale Chadwick, 18.Lourens Adriaanse, 19.Stephan Lewies, 2 0.Jean Deysel, 21.Charl McLeod, 22.Heimar Williams,23. S’bura Sithole.
Vodacom Bulls: 15.Jurgen Visser, 14.Akona Ndungane, 13.JJ Engelbrecht, 12.Jan Serfontein, 11.Bjorn Basson, 10.Louis Fouche, 9.Francois Hougaard,8. Pierre Spies (captain), 7.Jacques du Plessis, 6.Jono Ross, 5.Flip van der Merwe, 4.Paul Willemse, 3.Werner Kruger, 2.Callie Visagie, 1.Dean Greyling.
Replacements: 16.Bongi Mbonambi, 17.Frik Kirsten, 18.Marcel van der Merwe, 19.Victor Matfield, 20.Jacques Engelbrecht, 21.Piet van Zyl, 22.Handre Pollard, 23.Ulrich Beyers.
Kick-off: 7.10 pm.
