SPECIAL WP AREN’T GOING TO BE COMPLACENT
Beating Bulls in semi-final won’t be as easy as it was at Loftus, warns Dobson
ONLY the danger of complacency can stop this Western Province side. And according to head coach John Dobson, there will be none of that as they prepare for their semi-final against the Blue Bulls.
Throughout the 2018 Currie Cup season, there was never any doubt regarding Province’s chances at making it back-to-back title wins. But if you needed any more convincing, their 34-7 downing of their foes in torrential rain in Pretoria at the weekend should have done the job.
The last Currie Cup match of the weekend – which was initially delayed by 30 minutes – was abandoned at halftime as a result of the downpour and lighting threat at Loftus – conditions the hosts clearly struggled to deal with.
WP, on the other hand, were superb given the conditions as they had four tries by the 40th minute (one of which was a penalty try), absolutely destroyed the Bulls scrum and pounced on the many mistakes Pote Human’s team were guilty of.
They also showed outstanding defence – and that solid defensive pressure led to two tries by Sergeal Petersen and Jaco Coetzee respectively.
In their Currie Cup-opener against the Free State Cheetahs, WP also had to get the job done in inclement conditions. And just like it wasn’t too tough a task for the defending champions in Gauteng on Saturday, they also made it look easy when they wiped the soaking Newlands pitch with the Cheetahs (32-0) back in August.
And it was an experience that Dobson believes helped his team during the Pretoria downpour.
“It wasn’t (worse than against the Cheetahs),” Dobson said.
“That is where I think we got a lot of experience over the Bulls. We played the Cheetahs PRO14 team that the Bulls played against at Newlands in the rain and I thought we were exceptional.
“What we wanted to do is to come here and make it seem very daunting for the Bulls to come to us next weekend. (Province captain) Chris van Zyl’s whole talk in the week was to make a statement.
“This is a special group and they are definitely not going to be complacent.
“Also, we are completely aware that the conditions favoured us and some of those (Bulls players) made a few mistakes.
“We gained our territory largely off the Bulls’ wet-weather mistakes. It won’t be as easy as that next week.”
WP needed just one point to cement their spot at the top of the standings, so it’s not hard to see why Dobson was so pleased with his team’s bonus-point win – achieved in 40 minutes – in conditions that resembled an apocalyptic vision.
“To be honest, we are absolutely thrilled because we thought in those conditions to score four tries before halftime was exceptional,” he said.
“When the message came that we might only get a half in, we asked the players to play with massive intensity and do the damage like that and I think they responded incredibly.
“It was an exceptional performance from us.”
WP will face the Bulls in a rematch at Newlands at 5pm this Saturday, while the other semi-final will be contested between the Sharks and Golden Lions at Kings Park at 2.30pm.