Johan Ackermann

The Cell C Sharks may have had a less than auspicious start to their Super Rugby campaign, but they remain one of the fancied teams in the competition.

Lions coach Johan Ackermann, speaking to ahead of his team’s trip to Durban for their Round 2 match on Saturday, said the Cheetahs did not do his team any favours with their surprise 35 / 29 win over the Sharks last week.

On top of that, the Lions were also well below par in their 8 / 22 loss to the Hurricanes.

They are aware the welcome mat won’t be rolled out at Growthpoint Kings Park this week.

“Before the season started, I said they are one of the fancied teams, especially if you look at the depth they have,” the Lions coach said of the Sharks.

“Now the Cheetahs went and upset them as well.

“No doubt they will be determined to bounce back, so that makes the challenge even tougher.”

Ackermann said that is the nature of Super Rugby.

“We saw what the Western Force did and what the Rebels did.

“In this competition you simply can’t afford a bad day at the office and it will be the same this coming weekend.

“If we want to get a positive result we’ll have to improve our performance considerably.”

Ackermann, looking back at the disappointing performance against the Hurricanes, spoke of the team’s failure to finish opportunities and some individual decisions that cost them 2 or 3 tries in the 1st half.

There were also a number of missed goal-kicks, with flyhalves Marnitz Boshoff and Elton Jantjies kicking just 1 from 5 attempts between them.

“On occasion we placed unnecessary pressure on ourselves,” Ackermann said, adding: “Given the possession we had, we should have held a handy lead at halftime.”

The coach had reason to be concerned, given that they held 79% of the possession and 86% of the territory in that 1st half.

He said they will have to rectify that quickly.

“There won’t be too many games where you have that much possession and territorial advantage – we dominated everything, metres carried (408 to the 241 of the Hurricanes), line-breaks (7 to 5), defenders beaten (18 to 9), etc.

“We have to limit our mistakes and be more clinical.”

Ackermann said the result in Round 1 showed exactly how teams will punish you for a bad day at the office.

“I feel the entire season will be like that, it will be very close in every game.

“You just have to take your chances on the day.”

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