If you spend some time in Durban talking to the people who matter at the Hollywoodbets Sharks, it becomes clear that they might be the one South African franchise that has proper ambition when it comes to the Investec Champions Cup. And over these past two weekends we saw why.
The Sharks returned from their Vodacom United Rugby Championship tour that opened their salvo in this year’s competition with just one win from three starts looking a bit down in the dumps.
But everyone knew that would change once the Springboks were back to take them to full strength, and what a statement they made in seeing off the two most recent URC winners.
The Sharks were a little off at times in their win over the reigning champions, Glasgow Warriors, in their first game of the URC season at Hollywoodbets Kings Park. While most of what they did was good, and it has to be when you play a good team like Glasgow, there was a bit of rust, which was understandable after the top players were only reintroduced to the team and their Sharks jerseys a few days before the game.
They did perhaps blot the copy book just a slight bit by letting Glasgow in for two tries that earned them what could yet turn out to be invaluable log points, and possibly costly ones for the Sharks or another South African team.
But generally it was mission accomplished. And it went beyond that in their decimation of Munster, the 2022/2023 champions.
DURBANITES OWED MUNSTER ONE
The Sharks owed Munster one as it was Munster, by fighting back for a draw in their last visit to Kings Park in May 2023, that cost the Sharks a place in last year’s Champions Cup. Munster came back in that game to grab a share of the spoils, which consigned the Sharks to an eighth place finish that in that season was outside of Champions Cup qualification.
Munster again recovered a bit later in their most recent game, but there was such a wide chasm between the sides in the early parts of it that it was hard to believe that Munster were champions last season.
The Sharks will next get a chance to make a point against the other team to have won the URC in its three seasons of existence in its current guise, the DHL Stormers, who will visit Durban straight after the international break on 30 November.
Here though is where there is a challenge for Plumtree and the Sharks. Having so many Boks on your books can have drawbacks, and the coach might have to box clever for the Stormers game as so many of his players will only be returning from tour, and the last game against Wales in Cardiff on 23 November, that week.
Plumtree knows from past experience that sometimes rushing players straight back into Sharks duty after being with the Boks can backfire, as it did in his previous stint as Sharks coach when his Boks returned from a triumphant Tri-Nations campaign in 2009 to lose a Currie Cup semifinal to the Cheetahs.
And it was a similar story when his players returned disappointed from the 2011 World Cup and then lost to John Mitchell’s Lions in the domestic final in Johannesburg.
PLUMTREE HAS AWESOME TEAM WHEN AT STRENGTH
What Plumtree does know is what is clear for all to see - at full strength he has an awesome team. And the Champions Cup, unlike the URC, is the competition where all games are played at full strength.
Which is the context of the Sharks having two defeats on their record while Leinster, loaded with Ireland internationals, top the log after an unblemished six matches.
“Leinster have had their strongest team for how many weeks? We haven’t. I think everyone needs to cut us a little slack,” said Plumtree at the post-match press conference after 41-24 win over Munster.
“The challenges just keep coming, and then we’ve got Springboks needing to rest as well (according to national resting protocols), so there’s a lot to deal with in this club.
"Yes, I want to win all the time, but the reality is we’re not going to be a full strength Sharks team all the time. We can win without the Boks, but it is hard to win without all of them.”
The Sharks’ understrength team did though win the Currie Cup not that long ago, and showed pleasing commitment to the cause in doing so, while some of their blemishes on tour can be ascribed simply just to overload.
What team plays a 100 minute game, as the Sharks did in the domestic semifinal against the Bulls, in the pre-season?
Well, the Sharks do, and it cost them (the Bulls didn’t play in the final so they had a break), but to win the URC you don’t need to finish top of the log. In fact no team that has topped the log has won the URC yet.
The Sharks just need to get into the play-offs, when they will be at full strength, so there is no reason why they can’t win the URC as well as mount a strong challenge for the biggest prize of all, the Champions Cup.
And if they fall short in that quest, which is scheduled to finish before the URC does, the Sharks will be able to go all out for the URC in those final weeks. On the evidence of the last two games, they might be hard to stop if they get the bit between their teeth.