Two defeats have increased WP’s hunger
WESTERN Province flyhalf Tim Swiel says their Currie Cup results so far haven’t dented their hopes of securing a home semi-final.
Province opened their Currie Cup campaign with a loss to the Blue Bulls – the second one since the start of the domestic season – at Newlands, and when they travelled to Johannesburg to face the Golden Lions last weekend, they again failed to bag four log points.
While they can still host one of the play-off games, there’s no doubt that those odds will certainly fade if they lose their upcoming match, or any other after this one.
Swiel, who started at flyhalf against the Lions, said that they just need to start building 80-minute performances to get the results.
“That Bulls game took a bit of a knock, losing in the last five minutes, it’s the last few games at Newlands so we’re pushing for that home semi-final, we speak about it every week,” he said.
“The last two weeks haven’t been good in terms of results, but we’ve dominated stats in some areas, we just need to put it all together in terms of an 80-minute performance.
“We’ve got another opportunity at home this weekend and we could come into it quite negatively after last week, but the guys have come out at training quite positive.
“We’ve got a good one this weekend and then we have a week off before heading into the Boxing Day game.”
Province will know not to underestimate the Pumas after what happened at Mbombela during the Super Rugby Unlocked competition when a late surge by the visitors in the last quarter snatched victory from Jimmy Stonehouse’s group.
“We need to start well against the Pumas because if they start well, they get their heads up and then they’re hard to stop, as we saw at Mbombela,” Swiel added.
“We need to start well, control things from there and show a little bit of composure at the end and that will hopefully get us through the night.”
He also highlighted the threat his former teammate and one of the Pumas’ main men, Devon Williams, can bring. Williams, who recently moved from fullback to flyhalf, starred in their victory over Griquas last weekend.
“Devon was the winger when I was playing Under-21 and Labeeb (Levy) was the coach, so I know him very well,” Swiel said.
“He’s electric and he’s got a really good left boot, and those two attributes, running and kicking, is what you need for rugby.
“Obviously he hasn’t played so much at 10 so it’s going to take a bit of time, but I’m happy for him. He played better in his last game than he did in the previous game, but we’re focusing on ourselves this week to bounce back from the loss against the Lions and a bit of character.”