Most people don’t like Mondays, doing all they can to get through them with as little drama as possible. If you walk past a Sharks’ Monday practice, you would swear that Gary Gold, the director of rugby at Kings Park, despises them too.
You can hear him screaming from a 1km off, perhaps even from the clubhouse at Durban Country Club on a windless day. And he keeps it up for the full session, rushing every play like an extra loosie, imploring his players to “hit this, watch that, get out of there!”
And that was after they had bagged five points in Bloemfontein. But, to be fair to the dead-keen Gold, it is hard to discern the difference between a winning Monday or a losing Monday.
He gets just as fired up, as he searches for the key to unleashing the richest harvest of talent in South African rugby.
The players have bought into his all-in approach, even the clutch of Japan-based stars who had started to embrace the nuances of Feng Shui and tranquillity. Every Monday, Gold shatters that serenity, and demands that they go full pace in the pursuit of perfection.
“We’re getting there,” skipper Bismarck du Plessis chin-wagged this week.
“Every week, we are understanding Gary more, and the Cheetahs game was probably the closest to getting the perfect balance that we have come.
“It’s important that we go on a run now, especially here at home. I think we can get some continuity now, but the loss of Pieter-Steph (du Toit) is a big one for us,” Du Plessis said.
The loss of a 22-year-old is normally met with a shrug and a ready-made replacement, but the 2m-tall tank is not your regular Joe. The emotion of his sudden departure last Saturday rattled the squad to a man, everyone fearing the worst for the baby-faced blockbuster, especially in World Cup year.
The dreaded injury curse, which could wreck the best-laid international plans, is spoken of in hushed tones at the best of times, but the news that the youngster may only be out for three months lifted everyone around the Shark Tank and, no doubt, the Bok brains trust.
“He’s comfortably the best “5 lock” in the country, with all the attributes for that position. And he was playing really well for us,” sighed Gold. “But it’s another test of character for us.”
The Sharks have had plenty of those character tests in the last 18 months, but their enthusiasm to crack the Super Rugby code hasn’t wavered. The Sharks of 2015 may not have the consistency that the 2014 vintage had in the early stages, but they already have their fans intrigued by what they can do. Gold’s approach has been to tap into the attacking prowess that he has, especially out wide, and his flyers love him for it.
Dominance
“It’s been great, and as wingers, we want to be seeing the ball more and more, of course,” veteran Odwa Ndungane sang.
“When you look at our stats from last season, we won quite a few games, but we were one of the lowest try-scoring teams in the competition. This season, we have changed the approach, and you can see that we are right up there in the scoring charts, too.”
The wily Ndungane is not wrong, either. The Sharks’ haul of 29 tries last season was second-worst in the competition, along with the Rebels, beating only the Bulls’ return of 28. That poor strike rate meant that they never put teams away, and they paid for this in the latter stages of the round-robin season.
For all their forward dominance, the Sharks – to steal a football term – parked the bus. When the smarter opposition realised that they could run around the bus, there was little answer, and a campaign that held much promise, dissolved into yet another year of “if only”.
Ironically, the 2015 season has started with a mixed bag of results, but the mood around the stadium, as a whole, is far more chipper.
Silly as it may sound, the players are being encouraged to play rugby again, and they are loving the sound of their shackles being loosened. There is a method to the maddening Mondays that Gold creates, after all.
Before last night’s match, they had scored the second most tries, along with the Chiefs, with only the free-scoring Brumbies better than them. Of course, the defence has also leaked a few, and the Sharks know they will have to shore that up before they hit the road next month.
But, more and more, they are settling on a pattern that has already seen orchestrator-in-chief Pat Lambie turn out some of his finest fare and, in the process, cajole his eager backline into some enterprising interplay.
It’s not champagne rugby, not by a long stretch. The Sharks were guilty of trying to run before they could walk when they started the season, and were jolted back to reality. Now, they are finding their feet, and are dancing to a happy, Gold tune. Even on Mondays. – Sunday Tribune