The DHL Stormers still have to get into the action and will have other intentions, but the first two matches of Vodacom Super Rugby reinforced the pre-season view that the Cell C Sharks will be the team to beat in the South African conference.

Certainly the other three sides that played this weekend were light years behind the Sharks, and that confirms the view picked up in the last Absa Currie Cup season, when the understrength sides of the Sharks and Western Province dominated the league season before contesting the final: there really are only two strong unions in South Africa at the moment.

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If that comment motivates the Vodacom Bulls, Toyota Cheetahs and the Lions to disprove it, then that would be good. Super Rugby needs the interest that would be driven by a three-horse contest for the South African conference rather than a just a two- or one-horse race.

But they would surely have to admit that they were some way behind the eight ball on the opening weekend.

The Lions proved that Cheetahs coach Naka Drotske was right to be nervous ahead of the opening weekend.

Even though last year’s surprise entrants into the play-off rounds were playing at home, the Lions were always going to lift themselves in their first game back in the competition after missing last year so the Southern Kings could participate.

They did do that, and coach Johan Ackermann and his team were justified to enjoy a riotous celebration at the end of a tense game which was decided in the last minute with a Marnitz Boshoff drop-goal.

In winning the match, the Lions also sent out a loud warning to the Stormers, who will have to open their season at Ellis Park this coming weekend against a team that has a bit of momentum.

At the same time though, the Cheetahs should be kicking themselves for losing, because they shouldn’t have.

They had enough control in some periods of the game to have it wrapped up well before the end, and it would not have been so close had they kicked their goals, including one from almost in front of the posts towards the end that would have put them more than a kick ahead.

By contrast the Lions slotted everything and made the most of their opportunities.

For them the win will be a massive confidence booster as they had six players making their first appearance in Super Rugby. The Cheetahs had most of the team that played so well last year.

It is only one game, as indeed it was for the winning teams, so it would be wrong to get carried away, but the Cheetahs are going to have to guard against this defeat becoming more significant than it needs to be.

Super Rugby history throws up many instances where a team has bombed badly in a season mainly because of the massive psychological blow that comes with defeat in an opening match which they were expected to win.

MASSIVE PRESSURE

There was a lot of hype around the Cheetahs going into the game based around last year’s performances and the heightened expectations going into the competition.

They will be under massive pressure to beat the Bulls in Bloemfontein on Friday, as a record from the opening two home games of played two, lost two, will send them into the territory that blew the 2002 Sharks team out of the water.

Back then the Sharks team that had contested the previous year’s final lost unexpectedly at home to a depleted Stormers side in the first round, and before they knew it they had lost their first five matches.

Fortunately for the Cheetahs, they are playing against a Bulls team that on the evidence of the Growthpoint Kings Park match is several rungs down from the side of previous years.

Indeed, there were times in the Durban match where it was possible to wonder whether the two sides had swopped jerseys, such was the emphatic way in which the Sharks beat them at their own game.

Whereas in the past it was the Bulls who forced opponents into errors and then feasted on those mistakes by scoring off them, this time it was the other way around.

The Bulls’ kicking game was abysmal, with both halfbacks buckling under the pressure that was forced on them.

A large percentage of the Sharks’ points were the result of mistakes made by their opponents, which included a hoisted kick that put players offside, a step into touch, a charge down and failure to exit, a missed tackle… and the list goes on.

The Sharks by contrast, though never giving the impression they had engaged all of their gears, were excellent.

Their finishing was clinical and impressive, and the high level of organisation that was the product of Jake White’s hard work with the players on game-plan during the off-season was clearly evident.

As the coach himself said afterwards, it is a long time since the Sharks have started off the competition with a bonus-point win, and although the humidity wasn’t nearly as bad at kick-off as it was during the week building up, the four tries should not have been anticipated.

It is also a long time since the Bulls have been beaten so comprehensively, though maybe not as long as White thinks – the Sharks did smash the Bulls in the Kings Park league fixture in 2012.

The point though, is that it is early season and you don’t expect perfection. White will be the first to admit his charges were far from perfect, but they were far closer to that than any of the other teams that played at the weekend.