Safety first for cautious Sharks
COACH: TAKE THE REBELS LIGHTLY AT YOUR OWN PERIL
Du Preez’s charges in desperate need of bonus points in their tussle with Rebels for a play-off berth.
Coming from one of the great cities of the world, the Melbourne Rebels showed last weekend in beating the Brumbies how determined they are to stay in Super Rugby and the Sharks will be approaching them with caution in their match at Kings Park in Durban today.
The expectation is that the Sharks will comfortably see off the bottom side in the tournament and claim a bonus point, but coach Robert du Preez said the focus was very much on ensuring they get the win first.
“The Rebels’ win over the Brumbies shows that on their day anything can happen and I think they’ve actually been unlucky this season. Their defence is very good and they have two big wings, so they like to spread the ball to them. We can’t take them lightly and we’ll have to bring our A game.
“We want to play ball-in-hand and score tries, but it has not happened. So that’s definitely top-ofmind, but winning is more important to me than getting bonus points,” Du Preez said.
Bonus points have been a scarce property for the Sharks thus far, with just two in seven games, and their closest challengers in their conference, the Lions and Jaguares, have both done better in that regard with four and three respectively.
But at least the Sharks, who are coming off a bye after seven straight weeks of action, will go into what Du Preez called the “third phase” of their campaign with momentum to take into the June international window. They finds themselves in a massive dogfight with the Jaguares for the third qualification spot in the South African group.
“The focus is very much on our exits, we have to be more accurate in how we go about that,’’ Du Preez added.