Sevens star Agaba licking his lips for derby at Loftus

THE BULLS will be looking to stem the tide of their four-match losing streak and seeking redemption from their disastrous tour Down Under when they face the Stormers at Loftus Versfeld according to hard man Tim Agaba.

Agaba, who made his starting Super Rugby debut for the Bulls in last weekend’s loss against the Crusaders, will be playing in his first north-south derby but says his focus is purely on his contribution in ensuring that the Bulls break their losing run and fix the errors that have dogged their game in recent weeks.

“It doesn’t get bigger than this. It is the big South African derby here at Loftus and a nice one to be part of for me and I’m looking forward to it,” said Agaba.

“What is important to us is that we don’t go to sleep, we can’t rest on our laurels and we don’t focus on our losses. We’ve got to fix what we can and take it into this game. We’ll never go into a game planning on losing, but this is a big one for us.”

The enormity of Saturday’s occasion goes beyond the history behind this derby and the Bulls will look to rectify their defensive frailties especially the ones that saw them hand over dominance in the games against the Reds and Chiefs.

At the same time, the Bulls’ inability to replicate their second-half performances with the same intent on attack and defence as in the first half also came back to haunt them against the Crusaders, as well as their confusion when it came to stopping the rolling maul.

As confrontational as Agaba is on the field of play, the Mthatha-born number eight fronts up to the aspects of the game that have let his team down up to now and says they have no choice but to eradicate them by the weekend.