Injury curse hits Bulls
The curse of the Loftus training ground continues to hamper the Bulls preparations ahead of their first home game against the Rebels.
|||Johannesburg - The curse of the training ground at Loftus Versfeld continued to hamper the Bulls preparations ahead of their first home game of the Super Rugby season against the Melbourne Rebels when Springbok centre Jesse Kriel suffered a concussion Wednesday.
The explosive Kriel hit his head against a teammate during Wednesday morning’s training session and was ruled out of contention for the game leaving the Bulls thin on experience in the middle of the park.
Springbok centre Jan Serfontein will now move to outside centre and the abrasive Burger Odendaal will make his first start of the season at inside centre with Dries Swanepoel in line to make his Super Rugby debut off the bench.
Kriel becomes the eighth player after Grant Hattingh, Deon Stegmann, Handre Pollard, Duncan Matthews, Lappies Labuschagne, Bandise Maku and Lizo Gqoboka to suffer a freak accident on the training field and even though Kriel will only miss this weekend’s game against the Rebels, his absence will be a big blow to the Bulls.
Lock Hattingh also suffered a training ground injury to his neck on Tuesday afternoon and a final decision on whether he will be eligible to play will be made Thursday.
If Hattingh is passed fit to play then the former Lions utility forward will make his 50th Super Rugby appearance with nine of his matches having been for the Johannesburg based franchise before he moved to the Bulls three years ago.
“He got his head on the wrong side and I will not risk playing Jesse this weekend. “I won’t take a chance with his health and this means that Jan Serfontein will start at 13 and Burger Odendaal will move to 12.
“Both are good centres and they would have played in this combination further down in the competition,” Bulls coach Nollis Marais said Wednesday. “Grant Hattingh got injured on his neck and we conducted a scan that showed no damage but we will make a decision tomorrow (Thursday) after talking to him.”
However, the Bulls woes are bigger than overcoming the curse of the training ground, it is more about making ground on the critical parts of their game that failed them against the Stormers.
In a matter of a week, Marais and his management team must ensure that the small things work seamlessly if their set-pieces are to be resolute and not fall apart at the first sign of pressure from the opposition.
The truth of the matter is that the inexperience within the Bulls ranks told against the Stormers, especially in the line-outs and at the breakdown but Marais is confident that his charges will be much better on Saturday after a detailed and rigorous post mortem of their inept performance at Newlands.
“Technically there is a lot we can help the players improve on and that was our biggest focus this week and making sure that small aspects they get into line and stick to the structures that have been put in place. “I believe they will be much better and will grow every week,” Marais said.
Meanwhile the Bulls have secured the services of former Sharks and Southern Kings fullback SP Marais for at least two months with a decision on whether he will stay longer to be taken afterwards.
Marais was one of the players that have turned their backs on the Kings after the Eastern Cape franchise failed to pay him his November, December and January salaries.
Springbok scrumhalf Rudy Paige, Junior Springbok fullback Warrick Gelant and Odendaal have extended their contracts at Loftus until October 2018.
The Star