Durban - You can’t put a price on perseverance and team spirit and that is the big bonus the Sharks will take from an otherwise untidy performance in pipping the Dragons to the post in their United Rugby Championship (URC) game in Newport on Saturday night.
The Sharks took a match-winning 20-19 lead five minutes from time after being down 19-6 at the three-quarter mark after — as usual — the irrepressible Grant Willams pulled a rabbit out of the hat in the form of an intercept try to put the Sharks back in it and then super sub Sikhumbuzo Notshe came on and bashed a hole in the defence to set up the winning score by Thaakir Abrahams.
Up until that final quarter, the Sharks’ high error rate and penalty count kept ending promising attacking movements and the Dragons rattled up that 13 point lead via the boot of flyhalf Will Reed with his team having barely played any rugby.
“I am very happy with the result and very proud of the character the guys showed in getting the win,” a delighted Sean Everitt said afterwards. “In the second half, the discipline was very good when we were under the pump and I thought, in the end, the guys thoroughly enjoyed the win.
“But the first half was disappointing in that we could not get our attack going, mostly because the Dragons put a lot of pressure on our breakdown — they have a loose trio who have all played for Wales— and they hurt us there and forced us into errors.”
On a number of occasions, the Sharks ball carriers would make good yardage but then the move would be undone by a Dragons turnover at the breakdown.
“So we had a chat at half-time and the guys came out firing and stuck to the task,” Everitt explained. “We began putting them under pressure and I think Grant Williams’ intercept midway through the second half was a game-changer in that it gave the guys belief, and then credit to the subs, who came on and changed the game, particularly Notshe — he did really well to set up the try to go ahead in the game.”
The Sharks now travel to Dublin for their tour finale against Leinster. The Irish giants had a shaky start to the season against the two Italian teams, almost losing to Zebre and being made to sweat by Benetton, but were much better at the weekend when they beat rivals Ulster in Belfast.
Can the Sharks beat one of the best teams in Europe? The Bulls did it in Dublin in the last URC, so it is more than possible, but the Sharks will obviously have to play much better than they did in Parma against Zebre and against the Dragons.
If they can add the first half of their match against Zebre to the second half of the Dragons match they will be in with a good shout. In those periods, the Sharks attacked positively and with good results. They certainly have the strike power at the back where Rohan Janse van Rensburg is making an impressive impact and his centre partner Ben Tapuai, is playing his best rugby since joining the Sharks.
Also, the back three of Aphelele Fassi, Werner Kok and Abrahams is full of enterprise and each of those players looked dangerous with the ball in Newport.
IOL Sport