Cape Town - At first glance Bulls head coach, Gert Smal, with the blessing of Jake White no doubt, has selected what many would consider their “B-team” for their mid-week Currie Cup match at Cape Town Stadium (kick-off 8pm).
That statement, however, is rather disingenuous as the Bulls matchday 23 that will travel to the Mother City on Wednesday has quite a pleasing mix of experience, power, pace, skill and youthful exuberance to it.
The Bulls have, however, seemingly dropped any pretence of which encounter against Western Province Rugby this week is their focal point by arguably not fielding their “strongest” matchday 23 for their clash against the WP, instead opting to hold back their “big guns” for the season-defining encounter against the Stormers a few days later.
Nevertheless, the Pretoria-based side has a strong backbone to it.
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Morne Steyn will captain the side – his first time doing so – while the Bulls also welcome back Bismarck du Plessis from sanction, the former Springbok hooker renewing his front-row partnership with Simphiwe Matanzima and Robert Hunt in the Cup.
The team will also employ an interesting and untested mid-field pairing with outside centre Stedman Gans joined by utility-back Marco Jansen van Vuren, whose preferred position is usually at scrum-half.
Still, the initial observation stands, as no players from the starting XV that conquered Ulster in the URC this past weekend, find themselves in the squad that will take on the WP. A handful of players from the bench in the Ulster game, however, have made the transfer over to this matchday 23 – including the aforementioned Matanzima and Hunt, and also Reinhardt Ludwig, Keagan Johannes and skipper Steyn.
In this regard, it would seem that the management team at the Bulls have taken important learnings onboard from the previous double-header between the two sides in January, where they fielded a core group of their most senior players in both matches, only to lose the URC clash after handsomely winning the Currie Cup encounter.
Moreover, the matchday 23 selected by Smal also speaks to the return to strength from injury of several players, and the impressive depth that the union is beginning to build within the greater squad; and while at face value man could argue that this is not the Bulls best XV, it certainly still shaped up to be a powerful one.
The Currie Cup match kicks off at 8pm.
Bulls Starting XV: 15 James Verity-Amm, 14 David Kriel, 13 Stedman Gans, 12 Marco Jansen van Rensburg, 11 Stravino Jacobs, 10 Morne Steyn (capt), 9 Keagan Johannes, 8 Muller Uys, 7 WJ Steenkamp, 6 Jaco Labuschagne, 5 Janko Swanepoel, 4 Reinhardt Ludwig, 3 Robert Hunt, 2 Bismarck du Plessis, 1 Simphiwe Matanzima.
Replacements: 16 Joe van Zyl, 17 Lizo Gqoboka, 18 Sebastian Lombard, 19 Raynard Roets, 20 Werner Gous, 21 Bernard van der Linde, 22 Juan Mostert, 23 Richard Kriel.
IOL sport