Robert du Preez (snr)
Cell C Sharks director of rugby, Gary Gold, believes Robert du Preez (snr) will give his team an extra edge on attack in next year’s Super Rugby competition.
Former Springbok scrumhalf Du Preez is no stranger to Sharks rugby, having been a key member during the successes of the famous ‘Team of the 90s’ and he not only brings new ideas and experience, but the passion for the team, having represented the Sharks in 63 matches between 1992 and 1998 – during which 3 Currie Cup titles were won.
He will share the skills and attack coaching duties with Sean Everitt.
“Having Robert du Preez with us in the coaching staff is fantastic,” Gary Gold told the Sharks website.
“He brings a good edge, unbelievable knowledge, great attention to detail, fantastic ideas on attack as well, he’s really passionate about attack and I really like his work ethic. He’s a no-nonsense guy and everyone knows where they stand. So it’s exciting.
“And he’s a Shark, through and through – he’s played here, won trophies here and he’s excited to be home; it’s been brilliant to have him.”
Omar Mouneimne, who has been exposure at provincial as well as international level, is the team’s new defence coach and Gold is pleased to have him.
“He has a good couple of years under the belt – he’s travelled, was Nick Mallet’s defensive coach with Italy for 4 years. I worked with him in 2007 and 2008 when Rassie Erasmus brought him into the Stormers and those are 2 fine coaches who put faith in him.
“He is a particularly passionate individual and has an attention to detail on the work that he does that is in a different league to what I’ve seen in this country – and that’s a compliment to Omar and not an insult to anyone else – and because he has a martial arts background he brings a real element of the collision.
“That’s very valuable, as is his conditioning background, so he can marry the 2 very well. He brings incredible energy as well.
“Having Sean Everitt and Ryan Strudwick in the system already, with the 2 new guys who bring in a lot of energy is exciting for the guys.”
Gold knows how important the current pre-season will be to ready his team for the challenges of Super Rugby.
“We will put a tremendous amount of work into what we have identified as weak points shown this year. Our defence has to improve, our attack has to improve drastically, our breakdown… I think we made improvements in the scrum, our lineout was efficient, our contesting was very good and we will continue to look to improve in areas like that. But all our fundamentals need to improve, we have to really, really up our physicality; we have a huge amount of work to do.
“We also have a responsibility to giving our guys the highest skill level possible and finding ways to score tries.
“And attracting crowds. Our priority is to get back to winning ways,” he added.
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