When their plans fail, they fail miserably, but when those plans work as it did in last Friday’s 44-20 victory over the Griquas, the Blue Bulls will remain one of the top contenders in the Currie Cup competition.
The win, however, came at a price – as lock Juandré Kruger picked up an ankle injury.
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He will be assessed on Monday.
The Bulls’ victory marked the first occasion that the men from Pretoria managed to assert their authority without a large complement of Springboks in their ranks.
And although the team coached by Pine Pienaar did not opt to kick as much as they usually do, they dominated up front in a brutal display of forwards-based rugby.
“Decision making is a big thing and I don’t think it was a case of us changing what we do, so a lot of credit needs to go to the decision makers that stepped up,” Bulls skipper Gary Botha said after the match.
“That was the difference, we know that our playing pattern works when we make the right calls and that leads to more momentum and once we have that momentum we can play Bulls rugby.”
Asked why his men were in such an unforgiving mood, Pienaar said their loss to the Lions at Loftus Versfeld the previous week had a lot to do with it, and that the players were eager to regain the faith of their loyal supporters.
“A big compliment must go to our forwards who gave the backs great momentum in the first half,” said Pienaar.
“Our goal was to pull off a win and we knew Griquas is a difficult team to beat.
“We had a good first half and although there were still a lot of errors we are happy with the win.”
The Blue Bulls sealed the match in the first 40 minutes where they raced to a 32-3 half-time lead.