The Vodacom Bulls may be sitting with a flyhalf conundrum at the moment but one of their speedsters has stepped up to defend Springbok veteran Willie le Roux in his transition to fill the 10 jersey.
While the Bulls reaped the rewards of Le Roux’s flyhalf play against the Emirates Lions and DHL Stormers, the Hollywoodbets Sharks exploited the Bulls frailties on defence and sucker punched the Pretoria side for a famous victory last weekend.
Coach Jake White has publicly wondered about his decisions at 10, and while there has been some criticism of Le Roux’s play, his teammates are having none of it.
Winger Sebastian de Klerk, who didn’t play against the Sharks, said while the Bulls had a lot of depth at 10, Le Roux was not to blame for some of the mistakes against the Sharks.
“I think we lost the kicking game against the Sharks. They won the contestables and we made a lot of mistakes. That left us on the back foot and under pressure. We never were in control of the game,” De Klerk explained.
“But a lot of the stuff is stuff that is easy to fix. It’s just making sure the rush is a bit slower, and the folding a bit better. And then the individual tackles need to be made.
“We aren’t in a crisis mode, but we are working on correcting what we can correct and we’re focusing on controlling the stuff we can control.”
UNDERESTIMATE LE ROUX’S ROLE
De Klerk said people underestimated the influence that Le Roux had on the Bulls side and his role, even though 10 may not be a position he plays a lot.
“Goose is a very good player and has a lot of experience, and we have a lot of depth at 10 with Jaco (van der Walt) there as well. There are guys who are playing well. I haven’t played a game with Willie at 10 yet, but I really feel he is well suited to the role.
“He has a very good vision when it comes to the kicking game and he understands momentum really well. I think in the last game it reflected badly because we lost in other areas, like the kicking game.
“So then it is easy to look for scapegoats and to say Willie played badly. If he is at 15, then how many times does he pop up in the 10 channel. He doesn’t feel out of place to do that, but it is rather small things that come up - like defence, and when he needs to recycle and when not.
“Those are old habits and it isn’t really that he makes mistakes in the game. We have a lot of confidence in Willie, and everyone in the squad knows how much experience he brings to the squad.
“When he is on the field, you have a peaceful atmosphere, because he has a way of calming players down. He has helped me a lot and he knows how to change the momentum of a game, when we have played enough and when we should kick.”
NOT ENOUGH PRAISE
De Klerk said Le Roux doesn’t get enough praise for the way he plays.
“I can’t stress enough how important Willie is for the Bulls. He is someone who gets a lot of criticism and too little praise for what he does on the field.
"When Jake says he is like a coach on the field, it isn’t that he physically coaches you, rather that he identifies space on the field and will point you to areas which he knows from experience works.
“He has an ability to sum up a game very well. The communication from outside is there and he gets the necessary information. But at times people expect him to bring all the calm to the backline and that should rather be a team thing. Sometimes you need everyone to play their part and give good information.
“He backs himself and sometimes it doesn’t come off, but what rugby player doesn’t do that? I also do it, and also make mistakes. Willie is so good, but people tend to look at his mistakes more than the things that he does well.
"This past weekend against the Sharks there were a few times he did amazing work to cover space in the back field. People miss that, but it is that small detail that makes him so good.”
WAKE UP CALL
De Klerk believes the loss to the Sharks was a wake-up call for the Bulls, and that it would force them to focus more on winning this weekend’s match against the Lions.
“A loss is never nice, nobody goes on the field to lose. But we are still third on the log. At the Bulls we see losing as an opportunity to look at the stuff we could have done better.
"We don’t always look at it negatively. If you look at the competition the last few years, none of the sides that finished top have won the competition,” he explained.
“We try not to panic. We know you aren’t going to win every game and you know you are going to make mistakes. I think we just want to focus on the mistakes and what we can fix from a technical point of view and then stick together.
"It’s good to lose from time to time, it gives you a new perspective. You are forced to look at different things.”
LIONS A THREAT
But he is wary of the threat the Lions - and their Bok fullback Quan Horn poses to sides.
“The Lions are a very good team, they have very good outside backs. This weekend there was three or four times that Quan got the ball and beat the first defender. Against the Sharks it was definitely something we have to look at.
"Against the Sharks there were a few defensive errors and at this level if you switch off for a bit they are going to exploit that.
“We are working hard on that, to do the things we know we can control. You can’t prep for everything in a game, but we don’t want to give away soft tries this weekend.”
The Bulls will name their side for the encounter on Friday.