‘Sharks will fight to the bitter end’

Gary Gold is insistent that the Hurricanes will their work cut out for them when they face the struggling Sharks. Photo by: Gallo Images

Gary Gold is insistent that the Hurricanes will their work cut out for them when they face the struggling Sharks. Photo by: Gallo Images

Published May 6, 2015

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It is ironic indeed when Gary Gold speaks of the Hurricanes sensing “blood in the water” ahead of the visit of the Sharks to Wellington this weekend, but the former Springbok assistant coach is insistent that Super Rugby’s overall log leaders will have to sweat blood of their own to beat the Durbanites.

Fighting words indeed from a captain standing firmly at attention at the bridge as the good ship “Sharks” sinks deeper and deeper, but Gold is adamant that every gun available will fire while it can.

“The New Zealand Conference is very tight and the Hurricanes would be silly to even remotely take the foot off the gas, even if they are playing a team low on confidence,” Gold admitted. “Our form has been particularly poor, and they’re seeing our blood in the water, but they will also know through John Plumtree (the former Sharks coach who is now with the Hurricanes) that the Sharks will fight to the death.”

Gold conceded from the Sharks’ base in the South Island mountain retreat of Queenstown that the KZN team’s title ambitions have been extinguished after their fourth loss in a row last week and that the rest of the season is now about rebuilding faith from their supporters.

“It’s a matter of showing our supporters that this jersey matters a lot to us,” Gold said. “The poor performances have hurt us and we have to fix it.”

Last week, in Dunedin, the Sharks conceded 48 points, a dismal showing not much worse than the 50-point defeat to the Crusaders in Durban a few weeks before. Supporters of the Sharks are fed up, and the players and coaching staff know it.

“It was obviously a very disappointing game and we made a very good team look outstanding by making so many errors,” Gold said. “On 15 occasions we lost possession at critical times, and against a team with a backline as potent as theirs, that is going to hurt you. We saw it in the early exchanges when we lost the ball two-metres from their line and they ran the length of the field and scored.”

This week the challenge is against a team that is leading the competition and potentially more lethal on attack than the Highlanders. A similar error count from the visitors could result in another half century of points against them.

“This a matter of massive pride,” Gold said. “We’ve let a lot of supporters down. The expectations were high for this team. I’m not about to provide any excuses for what happened in our performance last week, it was sub-standard and we have investigated it.” - The Star

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