Jake White: Not about bonus points as Bulls embrace knockout rugby in Challenge Cup

Coach Jake White was delighted with how the Bulls scored nine tries against Zebre, but wants to see “knockout rugby” on the upcoming tour of Europe.

The Pretoria side varied their play cleverly – with flyhalf Keagan Johannes to the fore in a Player-of-the-Match performance – in dismantling a stubborn Zebre 63-24 at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday, where even a second-half fight-back from the Italian outfit was quickly crushed.

The men from Parma reduced the lead to 35-24 through hooker Tommaso di Bartolomeo’s try, but then the Bulls dominated the final quarter through touchdowns by Marco van Staden, Marcell Coetzee and others to finish the game in style.

But while they remained in third spot on the United Rugby Championship log – after Glasgow thrashed the Lions 42-0 on Saturday night – the Bulls’ attention shifts to the Challenge Cup this weekend.

They left Pretoria on Sunday to travel to France, where they will face Bayonne in the round of 16 on Saturday (1.30pm kick-off).

However, White still has to keep an eye on the URC, as he will have to juggle his resources carefully due to the Bulls’ tricky fixture list.

If they beat Bayonne at the Stade Jean Dauger, their next destination will be determined by the Edinburgh-Lions last-16 encounter on Friday night (9pm start).

If Edinburgh win, the Bulls must travel to Scotland for the quarter-final the next week, but if the Johannesburg side triumph, both SA outfits will fly home to square off in Pretoria.

It is unlikely that Bulls players will be able to fly up and down from Europe, as after the Challenge Cup quarter-final, they return to URC action against Munster in Limerick on April 19 and defending champions Glasgow six days later.

“It’s a five-pointer in the bag, and now we’ve got a really tough tour, with Munster and Glasgow away – and we know how strong those teams are away from home as well,” White told SuperSport after the Zebre match.

“We’ve still got our destiny in our own hands. We’ve got to make sure that we have a good tour, and get as many points as we can.

“It could quite easily be that we play Munster in the quarter-final, and Glasgow in the semi-final away, and Leinster in the final.

“It will be like a dress rehearsal, and it will be the same grounds and hopefully the same hotels, etc. That’s my message when we get on the plane tomorrow.

“It’s a great way to see how good we are away from home, and whether we can beat them in knockout rugby – it’s not about bonus points anymore. It’s about playing knockout rugby on this tour.”

White added that he was glad that there were no further injuries from the Zebre game.

But he will hope that star No 8 Cameron Hanekom is over his “stiff back” – which saw him withdrawn on Friday – for the Bayonne game.

Other Springboks such as Willie le Roux, Canan Moodie and Johan Goosen are all still out injured, but it remains to be seen whether Bok prop Gerhard Steenekamp and hooker Johan Grobbelaar will make the trip up north.

At least Johannes has solved the flyhalf concerns for the immediate future after producing an assured display.

The 25-year-old slotted all of his seven conversions, and varied his game between kicking and running to keep the Bulls going forward and bringing the backs and forwards into the game.

The forwards also stood strong in the scrums and lineouts, with Jan-Hendrik Wessels catching the eye – and the powerful duo of Akker van der Merwe and Wilco Louw, as well as loose forwards Nizaam Carr and Marco van Staden, made a significant difference in the second half.

So, the bench impact bodes well for the Bayonne playoff.

“The first prize was that I didn’t want any injuries, and hopefully now it looks like we might have got through this game without an injury, because we have a long tour ahead of us now,” White told SuperSport.

“Also happy with the bench. I think we got better and better as the game went on.

“They’re not an easy side. As I said before, they beat Munster and Ulster, and came within a point of beating the Sharks last week in Durban.

“It’s funny that I got a message from a Welsh friend of mine, who said the last 20 minutes looked like the real Bulls – it looked like how we used to be for the last 100 years, and it’s a great compliment.

“We got down there, we were clinical, we finished. We showed power, and then we also showed some touches of finesse in the 22 as well. I’m honestly very happy with that.”