Speak less and hope for a reaction. That’s Jake White’s recipe to get the frustration out of his system and get a positive reaction from his players after their poor home defeat in the Investec Champions Cup against Northampton Saints.
White struggled to hide his frustration at a 64 per cent possession stat and a loss on the scoreboard where his side did everything but win at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday.
And now with the imposing prospect of facing the Hollywoodbets Sharks with all their superstar Springboks in Durban this Saturday in a return to Vodacom United Rugby Championship action, White knows all too well that his side need to show a response for their own failings.
Asked what he planned to do, White said it was simple: “I just put a picture of the Springbok team in the change room and explain to them that this is the Springbok team playing in black jerseys,” White said.
“It's all I do because there's nothing. I mean this game next week is like the Springboks versus the Bulls and they have got to get up for it. And there's no way I can make it easier for them. It's the holiday season and there will probably be 50 000 people.
“Actually to be fair I actually would like to talk less this week to them and see how much responsibility they take.”
White lamented that the tasks the team had set themselves against Northampton were not fulfilled. And especially little moments, such as not taking points when the scores were level at 7-all and the side had a penalty in front of the posts.
“We said we weren't going to give them penalties. We said we wouldn't give them entries into our 22 We said that they've got a couple of trick plays that they would run especially if we gave them lineouts. You know, we said that we needed to play well at home and we never did any of those things.
“That for me summarizes what I'm feeling. There's no use just talking about it, you know, otherwise it means nothing so I'll have to sit them down and find out what went wrong with the little things.We get a penalty in front of the polls. We take a scrum.
“We've got the penalty now, some would say yeah, but you eventually forced the yellow card, but you know, we had a penalty there and then we took a scrum. It shows you how disconnected we can be at times about the actual flow of the game and that's That comes with experience that also comes with cohesion of guys playing together a little bit more.
It's not an excuse.We have got to get to a point where if we get into that situation, we need to understand why and when we're doing certain things.”
White has a number of injury concerns to worry about, including midfielder David Kriel and loosehead Gerhard Steenekamp, and will name his side for the big clash on Friday.