The most unlikely figure of reserve scrumhalf Bradley Davids, who had spent most of the game on the bench, was the man the Hollywoodbets Sharks mobbed in their ecstatic celebrations as his angled left footed kick secured his team their passage to the Vodacom URC semifinal.
If you struggle to make sense of all that, let it be explained. The Sharks and Munster were level at 24-all at the end of normal time in a tense face-off at Hollywoodbets Kings Park. They then played the 20 minutes of extra time, 10 minutes each way, without either team scoring any points.
So the tie-breaker was a kick-off, which meant three kickers from each team were assigned the task of kicking from various angles and distances in a set of six kicks for each team. Full marks to whoever it was in the Sharks coaching staff for figuring out that the astute kicking boot of Davids would be needed and sending him on with just a minute of the 100 minutes left.
You may not have known Bradley Davids before today 👀
— SuperSport Rugby (@SSRugby) May 31, 2025
Bet you definitely know him now 😏#SSRugby | #VURC pic.twitter.com/2jn5Z6WhDU
Starting scrumhalf Jaden Hendrikse was kept on the field as he would be needed as one of the kickers, with his brother Jordan completing the Sharks’ trio, so it was Makazole Mapimpi who made way and Davids stood on the wing as the final play of extra time was concluded with Jaden Hendrikse kicking into touch. That action was surely an indication that he knew his team would have the advantage in a kick-off.
And so it proved, with the three Sharks kickers turning in a 100% success rate with their first set of three kicks from differing angles on the 22, and then the two Hendrikse brothers were on target from the 10 meter line. Munster’s Rory Scannel had missed a kick, so when Davids lined up his final attempt he was effectively serving for the match. And when the kick sailed inside the right upright, the Sharks had secured their passage to Pretoria next week to play the Vodacom Bulls at Loftus.
A GAME THAT HAD SO MUCH
Phew, what a game. It didn’t start as a great game and when they trailed 7-0 at halftime the Sharks had just gone through their third successive half without scoring a try. In other words, more than two hours of rugby stretching back to their penultimate league game here at Kings Park against the Ospreys.
It was wing Calvin Nash who broke the early deadlock, and effectively scored the first try scored at this stadium for more than 90 minutes of rugby, as he ran onto a well placed kick down the left flank, and when Jack Crowley kicked the angled conversion Munster were 7-0 ahead. They should have been 10-0 ahead not long after that, but Crowley missed a relatively simple penalty attempt, something he may rue as he goes to sleep on Saturday night after this game of incredibly small margins.
Munster were the better team for the first half hour and it wouldn’t have been surprising had they put some daylight between them and the hosts in that period. But around the half hour mark the Sharks started to awake from their attacking slumbers, and although some of it was a bit one-dimensional at times, they started to make some headway.
However, Hendrikse missed a long range penalty and Munster’s defence stood firm so 7-0 to Munster it was at the break. The Sharks started the second half strongly and Vincent Tshituka, who would have come close to the man of the match award, came up with two great offloads that led to Sharks points.
The first was the one that set Ethan Hooker free down the right touchline, with the wing using his pace to cut inside and outstrip the defence to equal the scores with Jaden Hendrikse’s conversion. That was in the 45th minute and then was another much more outrageous Tshituka offload - it was actually more like a back flip pass behind his back - that set in motion a sustained long attack that eventually resulted in a penalty near the Munster posts that Hendrikse, again Jaden, kicked to put the Sharks ahead for the first time in the game.
It looked like the Sharks were taking control of the game then, but Munster weren’t finished as they cut the line to launch a long range attack that saw reserve prop Joshua Wicherley go over to put his team into a 14-10 lead after 57 minutes. Four minutes later they scored again to make it 21-10.
Many would have thought that was the game, but the Sharks showed their BMT and their hunger by fighting back and after a period of sustained pressure Jordan Hendrikse broke a half tackle after a scrum underneath the posts to free Aphelele Fassi for the score and then with six minutes later reserve hooker Fez Mbatha slid over for what appeared to be the winning try.
MUNSTER NEVER GAVE IN
Once again Munster weren’t finished and Conor Murray kicked a long range penalty amidst scenes of unbearable tension to send the game into extra time. The Sharks should have kicked themselves for not taking better advantage of their clear ascendancy in terms of possession and territory in the 20 extra minutes but in the end they will feel that justice was done.
It probably was in another way too - the Sharks finished third on the log after an 18 game season to Munster’s sixth. It’s odd that that wasn’t used as the tie-breaker after extra time, but there again that would have robbed all of us who were there of a very novel and exciting finish that was more redolent of a soccer penalty shoot-out than rugby.
The result means that for the fourth time in four seasons there will definitely be a South African team in the final as next week’s Pretoria semifinal is a derby.
Scores
Hollywoodbet Sharks 24 - Tries: Ethan Hooker, Aphelele Fassi and Fez Mbatha; Conversions; Jaden Hendrikse 3; Penalty: Jaden Hendrikse. Munster 24 - Tries: Calvin Nash, Joshua Wycherley and Diarmuid Cilgallea; Conversions: Jack Crowley 3; Penalty: Conor Murray.