The best attack in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship thus far, but still a whole lot of work to do before Johan Ackermann’s Vodacom Bulls can achieve their aim of winning the tournament.
As the tournament takes its November break to allow the Nations Championship to conclude, Ackermann’s Bulls are sitting pretty in second spot, with four wins from five but know that a lot of their tougher games are on the horizon.
And there are a lot of work-ons, especially as they had another dip in form on either side of halftime on Saturday, allowing Scarlets to claw their way back from 19-0 down to draw level at 26-all after 50 minutes.
The Bulls eventually pulled away as their bench took control of the game and powered to a 54-26 win, so it is hard to be too harsh on them considering the way they finished the game against a team that scored 40 points in Cape Town against the Stormers the previous week.
But with those tougher games on the horizon, the Bulls know other sides won’t be so forgiving, and while Stedman Gans’ yellow card was the catalyst for Scarlets’ comeback, the Bulls are still looking to see where they can improve.
LIONS ARE NEXT
The four-week break will allow that time for reflection and regrouping before they return to face the Lions in their return Jukskei Derby in early December.
And for now, the recurring theme of the dip in form is what concerns Ackermann, and the team are definitely looking for answers.
“We've been debating that, debriefing a bit after the game. Everybody has their thoughts. I think Hanro will probably speak on that a little bit better, how he felt on the field,” Ackermann said, musing whether the 30-plus degree heat four weeks in a row played a role.
“You would think that four games in this heat will take its toll, because it is physically demanding. We tried to freshen the guys up during the week, to cut some of our training, because we knew it's the fourth week in a row, and even if you play any competition in any conditions and there's a break, that's going to be mentally quite challenging to get the guys firing for 80 minutes.
“So we'll reassess everything. From here on, hopefully we can start pushing that 80-minute performance, but any game will have those momentum swings, but we might again make it not easy for ourselves.”
HEAT PLAYED A PART
Liebenberg believes the heat did play its part, but the Bulls will need to find a way to counter that in future.
“I would say it maybe took its toll a bit. I spoke to a few of the guys afterwards, and they say they felt a bit flat,” Liebenberg said.
“It could be the fatigue that sets in from a few weeks in a row playing at one o'clock, two o'clock. But we don't want to make excuses. At the end of the day, we got the result we needed with a really challenging week we've had.
And like the coach said, we haven't been training as well as we should this week, and then we've got [unclear] in the back of our heads. But I think we'd probably take this win any day if you offered it to us at the start of the game.”
The Bulls made 13 changes for the game, as they have done all season, rotating their squad throughout, but Ackermann didn’t want to blame that for the dip in form.
“ I really don't think that had that much influence. To be fair, if you look at the first half, there was some good play and the lineouts went well. There were limited scrums. Our continuity was good. We were a bit loose with the ball, but when we tidied that up we scored a fair few good tries, especially the one by Dylan Maart there in the corner.
“So I don't think it was that disruption of continuity. If I look at the mistakes we made, I don't think you can put it on the changes. I think it's just individual errors. We were maybe not accurate, and then again, it's a team, it's a 23-man effort, and we always knew that our bench would make a difference, and they did. So credit to them.”
IMPRESSIVE STATS
Despite all of this, the Bulls attack stats look very impressive for this time of year. They lead the URC’s stats on attack with 214 points in five games, scored 31 tries so far, have had 60 clean breaks and beaten no less than 146 defenders in the process.
Defence could use some work still, but is understandable given the attacking-minded approach. Still, the Bulls sit on 76 per cent tackle completion rate, not good enough at this stage to win a tournament, and something they will be working on more.
The stat of 98 missed tackles and 72 turnovers lost will concern them and will be part of the reflection process this season.
Discipline is another area that can be better - three yellow cards in five games and an average of 10 penalties a game conceded leaves them 13th in the tournament in terms of discipline, which they will want to have better.
Given the sizeable loss when Wilco Louw left for the Stormers, the Bulls scrum has been quietly going about their business and is currently ranked fourth in the competition, with a 96 per cent success rate - and a feather in the cap for one of the more underrated scrum coaches in the competition in Werner Kruger.
Finally the lineout is functioning well, with a 92 per cent success rate, and nine stolen lineouts on opposition ball.