Jacques Potgieter – enjoying the Sydney experience
I’m sure that everybody who has been following the Waratahs and their progress to ending first on the 2014 Super Rugby log will agree that Jacques Potgieter has played an integral part in their rise.
He has been playing with the same robust “kamikaze” style that first got Heyneke Meyer to lure him to the Bulls, and that gave him his three Springbok caps, but he has refined his game at the same time.
As good as he has been to the Waratahs, the Waratahs have been equally good to him. He has evolved as a rugby player and instead of the Bulls forward blueprint of head down and charge, he has been delivering some deft offloads and touches. He is a much more rounded player, and the frightening part is, all within the space of one season.
AAP & SMH
From outsider to cult hero in less than a year, Jacques Potgieter couldn’t hide his grin when quizzed about the Bulls’ futile pursuit of him in recent months.
Locked into a two-year commitment to the Waratahs, with the caveat that he be released to play in Japan with the Fukuoka Sanix Blues during the Australian off-season, Potgieter was never going to rejoin the province where he made his debut two years ago.
But that doesn’t mean he didn’t enjoy the attention.
“They told me, ‘You don’t know what you’ve got until you lost it’ – they actually told me that – and it’s very nice to know they want me back,” Potgieter said.
“But I made a decision to be here and I came here on a two-year deal and I’ve started something and I want to finish it. I want to play out my two years and it would be silly for me to leave what we’ve got here.”
Potgieter couldn’t get a start at the three-time Super Rugby champions in his final season there last year, and jumped at the chance to join the Waratahs under a coach he rates as the best he “will ever have”.
The towering loose forward might have wondered what he’d done when he flew from the Japanese winter into a trial match in Albury in 40-plus degree heat.
But any doubts were short-lived. The standing ovations started after a handful of games and Potgieter felt at home at Moore Park.
“The boys started making jokes with me in the first week, like hiding my car,” he said.
“Just the way they accepted me, I can’t thank them enough for it. It brings out the best in me.”
Potgieter has no doubt that his new team has what it takes to lift the Super Rugby trophy in 2014.
Training with the Waratahs
And cautious coach Michael Cheika has no qualms with the former Springbok talking up the Waratahs, despite the obvious dangers of supplying their rivals with added ammunition.
Lured from the Bulls at the start of the year, Potgieter has been a believer since day one and even tipped the Tahs for title glory when they were languishing mid-table mid-season.
The abrasive forward certainly isn’t backing off now that the Waratahs have captured the minor premiership with a club-record seven straight wins.
“With the boys we’ve got here, it’s amazing talent and, since the beginning with all those guys, it’s been so special,” Potgieter said on Thursday.
“I knew that when the boys were going to click and get it all together that we would be unstoppable.”
The Waratahs have this weekend off before hosting the Brumbies, Chiefs or Highlanders in a sudden-death semi-final at Allianz Stadium on Saturday week.
“It doesn’t matter who we play in the semis. If we just concentrate on our stuff and do our own things well, we’re going to be unstoppable,” Potgieter said.
“I can’t wait for that day when the guys peak and just everything goes correctly to plan.”
“On that day, it’s going to be very dangerous and very exciting to watch.”
Since the pre-season, Cheika has made no secret of his side’s aim to finish top two in the minor premiership in order to secure a home final.
But he’s also been at pains not to talk up the Waratahs’ title prospects.
Now, though, he’s relishing the chance for the Waratahs to finally deliver.
“That’s what you play the game for. That’s why we’re here. This is unreal,” Cheika said.
“There’s more at stake because it’s knockout and we know that.”
“But we’re prepared to take the consequences of however we play, good or bad.”
Cheika sees no value in gagging his players, or asking them to tone down the talk.
“Jacques is like our showman, and we let him do that because it’s fun,” he said.
“We’re very aware that just because we finished first that we haven’t got any right to win anything.”