WP looking good, but still room for improvement

WESTERN PROVINCE coach John Dobson might not be sweating over his team’s Currie Cup log position any longer, especially after their emphatic win over the Golden Lions, but there are still a few areas that Province want to get right ahead of their match against the Sharks.

After a shock defeat to Griquas in Kimberley a few weeks back, Dobson emphasised the importance of winning home games. And WP have done that.

They racked up wins against the Pumas and the Blue Bulls, and their latest one over the Johannesburg team saw WP show off as they seemed to have learned from the mistakes that they paid for in their earlier encounters.

At the weekend, Province had much less possession than the Lions, but they made full use of the chances they got to run in six tries and limit the visitors in a 39-3 victory.

They were massive on defence, and although their solid defence must have been a very pleasing aspect for WP’s coaching team, defence coach Norman Laker would like to see Province do more with ball in hand against the Sharks.

“You can’t make 280 tackles in every game. We’re dangerous with ball in hand, so it’s important to keep the ball in hand,” Laker said.

“We weren’t perfect (against the Lions)... we missed 19 tackles, so we can still improve on that.”

Against the Lions, Province made a number of double tackles and, this weekend, Laker would like to get a bit wider on defence.

The Lions did, however, manage to find some space out wide, but Laker said that the two-man tackle approach couldn’t be blamed for taking away some of their width and making them more narrow on defence, but attributed the Lions’ leeway out wide to “lapses in concentration”.

“I (also) think we just need to concentrate for the full 80 minutes. It’s important for us to improve in every single game.”

But WP’s set-piece also functioned like a well-oiled machine – and it’s something that lock JD Schickerling wants to continue against the Sharks.

“The lineouts can’t always go perfectly, but I think that’s a real strong point for us at the moment and we can lay a good attacking base from it,” Schickerling said. “And we will definitely keep the pressure up at the lineouts and scrum time.”