What Sharks should take away from their latest learning experience

There were enough good moments in the game for him to be optimistic about the Cell C Sharks’ future, but coach Sean Everitt would have left Jonsson King’s Park at the end of his team’s Rainbow Cup campaign more convinced than ever about what needs to be changed.

That there would be no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for the Sharks became evident long before the Vodacom Bulls scored their fourth try to make it official that the Durbanites faced a bridge too far in their quest to be the South African representatives in the grand final in Treviso.

TURNING POINT

He agreed after his team’s 34-22 defeat that the turning point came long before that, and it was something his opposing coach Jake White agreed with too: The Sharks’ best chance of achieving their objective of scoring a big win with a four-try bonus point was presented to them in the last 10 minutes of the first half.

Although they were being hammered in the scrums, the Sharks were finding clever ways to get around that disadvantage. While they were second in the scrum battles, the other aspects of the forward battle were actually going the Sharks’ way, with big lock JJ van der Mescht getting his team go-forward in the mauls. He was well supported in that regard by the physical Thembelani Bholi.

And with Phepsi Buthelezi running as a No 8 in a way that would take old-timers back to Andrew Aitken or even, for the even older old-timers among Sharks supporters, Tom Bedford, things were looking up for the Sharks. They were pressing for a second try after Van der Mescht had just dotted down the first.

POISED TO TAKE CONTROL

When Bholi looked like he had forced his way over the line, the Sharks looked poised to potentially take control - had the try been awarded, they would have added a further seven points to their one-point lead, and with two tries would have been halfway to their main objective.

“If the Sharks had gone into the break already having two tries, it would have been a big boost for them,” agreed Bulls coach White.

And Everitt concurred: “Absolutely correct, if we had got over the line then it might have been a different game, but unfortunately, we didn’t take our opportunities.”

That the try didn’t stand was because of good work defensively from the Bulls. A great tackle on the line dislodged the ball from the Sharks’ grasp. A few minutes later, the miss was felt more acutely for the Sharks when, almost inevitably, the Bulls scored a try against the run of play.

It was the visiting team’s ability to win the big points that has pushed them to the forefront among South African teams since rugby returned from the pandemic hiatus, and they did so again.

CONSISTENTLY LOSING BIG POINTS TO THE BULLS

The Sharks have won their big points against other teams in that time, which is why even though they finished behind the DHL Stormers on the final Rainbow Cup SA log, most people would probably consider them the main pretenders to the Bulls’ championship status. But against the Bulls they don’t win the big points, they lose them.

Everitt will know that and that will be one learning experience he will hope his team will take away from what was effectively a local Rainbow Cup decider similar to the domestic decider (Currie Cup) that was played at Loftus in January. With the same result, although the Bulls were more emphatic winners this time.

But Everitt will also know that the learning experience doesn’t stop there, with his team, but also extends to himself and whoever is responsible for contracting at the Sharks. For through all the huff and puff produced by the Sharks forwards in the first half, there was something that even their most optimistic fans just knew from past experience: it wouldn’t last.

NEED TO RECRUIT FORWARD DEPTH

And it was never going to last for the same reason that keeps cropping up in every post-mortem after a Sharks defeat to a team that boasts a good pack - they just don’t have the forward depth to sustain the kind of intensity and power play produced in periods of the first half over a full 80 minutes.

Everitt said afterwards that the late change to his bench, with Springboks Thomas du Toit and Ox Nche having to withdraw on the day of the match because of an objection from the Bulls, “crippled” his team’s challenge.

He may be right in saying that made it harder, but he’s also being a bit disingenuous if he blames anyone other than himself for that. The Sharks knew long ago, like all the other franchises did, about the Bok resting protocols. That they ended up having to concertina all their changes into the last two games is something they only have themselves to blame for.

It is also fair comment to suggest that the Sharks are going to go nowhere if they continue to rely so heavily on Du Toit and Nche, who are going to be missing for most of the second half of the year anyway because of national duties.

If the Sharks want to compete for the status that the Bulls enjoy right now, they are going to have to ensure they have more than just one good front-row.

In fact, given the fixture list that lies ahead, they are going to require three or four backup players in the front-row positions. And that means prop, not hooker, where the arrival of Bongi Mbonambi next season will leave them with a surfeit of players in that position, just like flank, where Siya Kolisi’s arrival didn’t appear to address any glaring need.

EVERITT NEEDS TO LOOK AT FLYHALF TOO

On the subject of Kolisi, his lack of influence on games must be a concern for the national coaches, particularly when other players not in the Springbok group like Marcell Coetzee are playing so well. And while on the subject of the Springboks, it is hard to see how national director of rugby Rassie Erasmus can describe Curwin Bosch as unlucky to miss out on the cut for the British and Irish Lions series when he shirks his tackling role like he did at the weekend.

He won’t have Kolisi in his group for the next few months as he will be with the Boks but he will have Bosch. So, who wears the Sharks No 10 jersey is perhaps something Everitt needs to mull over too.