Home ground advantage key
The mighty New Zealanders have to re-write the record books, with no Kiwi side having won a play-off on Highveld.
History favours the Lions in their quest to win their first Super Rugby title and breaking South Africa’s seven-year drought in the southern hemisphere competition.
Of the seven finals South African teams have contested, they have won three, all of which had been on home soil, albeit two of these were all-South African affairs.
History also shows that no Kiwi team has won a Super Rugby playoff match on the Highveld, which should be a worrying sign for the Crusaders.
Another interesting fact is that the last three champions – the Waratahs in 2014, the Highlanders in 2015 and the Hurricanes in 2016 – have all been first-time winners.
Today the Lions will have the perfect opportunity to continue this trend.
Saturday Citizen takes a walk down memory lane and takes you through the seven finals South African franchises have contested.
Losing to the Queensland Reds and Auckland Blues in the last two weeks of regulation play, Gary Teichmann’s men had two scores to settle in the semifinals and final. The first they did in emphatic style, travelling to Brisbane to run in seven tries in their 43-25 win against the top-of-the-table Reds. But clearing the final hurdle against a star-studded Blues line-up, who destroyed Northern Transvaal 48-11 in the first semifinal at Eden Park, was always going to be a tough ask. The Blues team included six All Blacks who started the 1995 World Cup final against the Springboks in their line-up: Craig Dowd, Sean Fitzpatrick, Olo Brown, Robin Brooke, Zinzan Brooke and Jonah Lomu. The Sharks did well to be in with a chance at only 20-16 down at half-time, but the home side was just to strong for the visitors in the second half, finishing the match with six tries to two and winning the first Super 12 title on offer.
Sharks 19, Bulls 20
The history books were rewritten at the business end of the season as the Sharks became the first South African team to top the table. The Bulls broke all scoring records in their 92-3 demolition of the hapless Reds to secure a home semifinal and then both dispatched of Kiwi opposition to set up the first all-South African final. After the Sharks beat the Blues 34-18 in Durban and the Bulls outmuscled the Crusaders 27-12, the scene was set for an epic encounter and that is exactly how it panned out. The Sharks played the perfect game to keep the Bulls’ power game at bay, but when Albert van der Berg crashed over late in the second half, the Durbanites failed to close the door as Frans Steyn missed the conversion. The Bulls kept the ball alive until after the final whistle with Bryan Habana diving over and Derick Hougaard slotting the winning conversion in dramatic fashion.
ACT Brumbies 36 Coastal Sharks 6
After finishing the 2000 season dead last with a solitary win in 11 matches, coach Rudolf Straeuli led a remarkable turnaround which saw the Durbanites finish second behind the Brumbies – led by George Gregan – setting up the first all-South African Super Rugby play-off match against the Cats. In a highly unusual scenario, the Brumbies hosted the Reds in the other semifinal in a season where no New Zealand side managed to qualify for the play-offs. Butch James was in tremendous form as the Sharks beat the Cats 30-12 in Durban with Eddie Jones’ Brumbies beating the Reds 30-6. The final was a bridge too far though for the Sharks, as rugby league convert Andrew Walker delivered a fine kicking display by slotting five penalties and three conversions in a one-sided match in which the Canberra team became the first Australian outfit to win the Super Rugby title.