Munster's visit a red letter day for White

Jake White sees the visit of Munster to Loftus Versfeld next Saturday as a red letter day for the Bulls.

The Bulls director of rugby believes his team will face an uphill struggle in the United Rugby Championship (URC) should they come up short against Johann van Graan’s team.

White isn’t exactly swinging from the chandeliers over his side’s form in the URC. SA’s blue ribband team are 10th on the points table before the latest round of matches with just four wins from 10 matches.

“The first thing we have to do is beat Munster,” stressed White. “If we don’t we are going to play catch-up from there. Last week we were five points behind the conference leaders and now its three points. We have to beat Munster but we have to win all our home games and then, I suppose, the big one will be the Stormers away.”

The Bulls will, however, have to embrace a few things that don’t necessarily come to them naturally. In recent times they haven’t had to play catch-up. They have set the tone on the domestic scene but now White believes his team will face a different kind of pressure.

Updated Bulls’ playbook

They will also have to expand their play book, especially on attack. The Bulls’ blueprint generally revolves around suffocating forward play, robust defence and dynamic kicking.

White admits the pace and speed at which matches are played surprised him at the start of the URC when they suffered a chastening defeat to Leinster. Five months on White sees next week’s clash against a team of the same ilk as a good barometer for his team.

He says the Bulls have improved their tempo and their attack but they were still off the pace. “We scored 20 tries compared to Leinster who have 42 tries. They are the benchmark, the same as the Crusaders are in Super Rugby.

“In the Currie Cup you can scrum and maul your way out of your half. Over there they will play out of their half with their backs and through interplay between backs and forwards. That’s why they create more try-scoring opportunities than South African teams.

“To win the competition you have to score four tries in every game. If you do that you are going to win more than you lose. Even if you get to fifth or sixth best in defence I still don’t say that guarantees you winning the competition.”

Recruitment review

White explained that they ahve been forced to recruit differently. “If you are picking a Springbok pack then you can play a certain way because you can play an international brand,” he said.

“When you are recruiting when the best players are playing abroad, you have to think a bit differently about how you want to play. There is always that chicken-and-egg debate. Do you play a style and get the players that suit it, or do you get the players and then adopt a style? No-one knows the answer to that because there is no right or wrong.”

In developing a more attacking approach the Bulls have perhaps lost some of their edge in defence. They are ranked 15th out of 16 on defence, according to the competition’s official statistics. “Stats are like a bikini,” White said sagely.

“It only covers the part you want to see and shows you all the parts you don’t want to see. We are 15th or 16th in terms of tackle completion. Defensively we haven’t leaked the most tries.”

The World Cup-winning coach was hoping to take more momentum into this phase of the competition. The lost home matches against the Stormers and the Sharks have left them with little room for error.

Short of expectations

“No coach is ever happy when you are not close to the top of the log,” said White. “We started the campaign on a high having won the Currie Cup twice. I suppose the expectation was that we would go into Europe and things would just fall into place.

“I’m not unhappy but I’m also a realist. I’ve seen enough times when teams go into new competitions there’s new challenges and it doesn’t necessarily mean you get them right in year one. That is not an excuse but having lost key guys like (Johan) Goosen early on, Duane (Vermeulen), Marco (van Staden) and Trevor (Nyakane) in the forward pack, not many teams can release those guys and continue the momentum that we had.”

White pointed enviously to the Sharks, whom he said had acquired five Springboks in recent times, while the return of Warrick Gelant has brought dynamism to the Stormers.

He reminded that SA teams’ positions on the log are compromised by the high number of away matches they’ve played. “If you look overall in the competition five of our games have been overseas, which is a difficult ask. I think there is a 20 or 25% chance of winning away from home in this competition. Not just us — everybody.”

White said while there is huge expectation on the Bulls to win their home games they won’t have the full benefit of playing at what they regard as fortress Loftus. They were hoping to call on their greatest ally. “We really hoped that by the time we play at home we would have crowds,” White sighed.