Opener too close to call

In what essentially comes down to a battle between last year’s Super Rugby finalists and the Currie Cup champions, the Lions and the Cheetahs will both be desperate to kick off the season in style in Bloemfontein this afternoon.

The mid-afternoon kickoff has all the ingredients of a spectacular match-up – rain permitting – and Lions captain Warren Whiteley (above) admitted they have been itching to get the season underway.

“It’s important to peak at the right stages but it takes time, there’s so many variables in the first game,” he said.

“So it’s a bit of an exciting, nervous feeling, but we have seen and learned a lot in the past three years where we have learned a lot of lessons.”

Cheetahs coach Franco Smith would have made an intense study of what made the Lions machine tick last season and if they can prevent the Lions recycling quick breakdown ball, the visitors might find the going tough.

For this reason Smith has picked two Springbok flankers in Oupa Mohoje and Uzair Cassiem to slow the Lions’ ball down, while they would have seen the Lions’ scrum is not the threat it used to be with Julian Redelinghuys not there to anchor proceedings.

A lot will depend on whether tighthead Ruan Dreyer can create the proper right shoulder and whether blindside flanker Ruan Ackermann can make up for the big loss of Warwick Tecklenburg.

Whiteley, however, is upbeat they can produce the goods and is not concerned that some of the players in the squad who spent time in Japan didn’t really have an off-season.

“We are hungry for rugby and that’s a great sign, but I believe all the teams are,” he said.

“A guy like Elton Jantjies is a real professional, if you see what he does off the field, the time he puts in with recovery, he actually invests in it.”

Kick-off: 3.05pm.