How the Sharks got themselves into a deep hole
An emotional farewell was promised from their final United Rugby Championship (URC) clash in Durban for Sharks stalwart Thomas du Toit and skipper Siya Kolisi. The emotion was provided, but it was the wrong sort of emotion, and the anger is justified.
The Sharks can still end up playing in the Heineken Championship Cup next season as there is a backdoor route available for them. But it will require them to win the URC, and that means beating mighty Leinster in an away quarterfinal, probably without Kolisi and Curwin Bosch, and then winning two more away playoff games. In their current form, that just ain’t going to happen.
The headlines on Saturday night summed it up, with the word “disastrous” featuring several times. Make no mistake, the richest SA franchise missing out on Heineken Champions Cup rugby next year is a calamity, not only for the Durban team but for the country.
The Stormers might have outperformed the Sharks in the first two years of the URC. Word is that they are on the verge of clinching a good equity deal. But Bulls coach Jake White was right when he said back in December that it isn’t an equal fight between the franchises/ unions and the top Champions Cup clubs/provinces when it comes to financial muscle.
PROPER GUN
The Sharks are the only local franchise who come close to being able, as White would put it, to take a proper gun to the gunfight in terms of their ability to secure the top players and the depth needed to compete in the elite European competition. With by far the most marquee players and Boks in their group, it was the Sharks that most South Africans expected to carry the flag in Europe.
To some extent they did, showing glimpses of their potential with their tempo and brilliance that saw them being competitive until the 70th minute at the most formidable of away venues in Toulouse. They eventually shipped 50, but I was looking forward to seeing the Sharks learning from that experience and being more competitive next year. That is now unlikely to happen. It really is their own fault.
The Sharks have had to learn the painful lesson that you can’t target the Heineken Cup at the expense of the league that provides the platform for your elevation into the elite competition. That the Sharks were playing a dangerous game dawned on me a few months ago when they sent what almost looked like a C team under their Currie Cup coach to go and play
Connacht in Galway. The Sharks ’ first-choice players were available for that game, but the Sharks decided to keep them at home to prepare for the Champions Cup game they were playing the next week against Bordeaux Begles. They lost a match they would almost certainly have won had they shown the URC more respect.
Ultimately, that was the difference between them playing Champions Cup next year and playing Challenge Cup.
So too admittedly was their rotten luck in late October when Ulster were able to get out of their commitment to play the Sharks on what was supposed to be their big fan day and the first-time unveiling of their full-strength team, meaning Eben Etzebeth et al all playing on the same day, because of a tummy bug.
BIGGER PROBLEMS
Ulster were struggling then, the Sharks had just beaten Glasgow Warriors 40-12, and the smart money would have been on the Sharks. But Ulster were allowed to come back later in the season when the Sharks were forced to rest their Boks, and took advantage.
There are bigger problems at the Sharks though that go beyond their mistake in not realising they needed to focus on the two international competitions in equal measure, which would require a different contracting model to their current one. Marquee players don ’ t help you thrive in the URC, where so many games are played when the top players are on international duty. That is something the Sharks might be right to complain about, but it is nonetheless a fact they knew about, and should have had the wisdom to work around.
John Plumtree will take over as coach on July 1 and on the evidence of what we’ve seen from the Jekyll and Hyde Sharks this year, his biggest work-on is going to be the team culture, something the Stormers have worked out under John Dobson but the Sharks are a million miles from getting right.
If one statement can sum up the hole the Sharks have got themselves into, it is that money can buy you players, but it can’t buy you culture. Only once that second part has been rectified will the Sharks be comfortable in their quest to be assured of their Champions Cup challenge being an expectation rather than a sporadic occurrence.