Durban – Sharks coach Gary Gold has been around long enough to ensure he does not repeat the mistake of making public statements on playing style that his team end up unequipped to back up.
The Sharks play the Lions in Pietermaritzburg tonight (7pm) in a friendly and then start their Currie Cup campaign next Friday against the Pumas, but there are no bold proclamations emanating from the Sharks camp.
“Committing to a playing style for the Currie Cup? Nah, I have made that error before!” Gold said with a wry grin, referring to the ‘bums-on-seat’ rugby the Sharks boisterously promised before Super Rugby kicked off but could not produce as key players fell by the wayside to injury and suspensions, and the end result was a Sharks team playing survival rugby, which translated to whatever it took to get a win and to hell with entertainment.
For Gold, who has been around the coaching block more than a few times in a long career, it is a case of “once bitten, twice shy”.
“What you will see from us is ‘pragmatic’ rugby’,” Gold said. “In other words, an approach that first and foremost wins the game, but if we can be exciting in the process, obviously we will embrace that, but the win comes first.”
Gold said that the lesson he had learned in his painful introduction to Sharks rugby earlier this year is that failure is not tolerated in KZN.
“We have to win, like it or not. We can dress it up and put ribbons in our hair, we can call the rugby we play whatever the heck we want, but the bottom line is that the demand in Durban is that the Sharks win,” Gold added. “That is the expectation of this franchise, and the coaching staff and the players fully understand the priority.”
This does not mean the Sharks are going to disappear up their own backsides and play boring, no-risk rugby, too afraid to have a go when opportunity arises. With the average of the players around 24, that is an impossibility.
“I am very careful about buzzwords,” Gold said, again raising a sardonic smile. “What I will commit to is that our game will be underpinned by ‘hunger and desire’ That is all I ask of the players. I want us to play to 100percent of our potential for 100percent of the time. With the squad we have, that means we should win more games than we lose, and if that secures us the trophy, fantastic. But that is all I can control. I just want people watching the Sharks to say: ‘Wow! These guys are keen. The give everything’.”
Gold admits that his opponents tonight, the Lions, have showed the way forward for South African teams in the way they have tackled Super Rugby since their return from the wilderness in 2014 (they were relegated for the Kings in 2013). “The Lions were written off but both last year and this season emerged with huge credibility and only just missed the play-offs in 2015,” Gold said. “The enthusiasm with which they play has won them many fans. They have not lost too many players from Super Rugby and the way they have been playing this year must make them favourites for the Currie Cup.”
Gold said that tonight’s match would literally be a game of two halves for the Sharks. The players that start the game will be given a full 40 minutes and at half-time a new team will come on for the next 30, thus giving each player a solid period to state his case. - The Star