Another Vodacom United Rugby Championship season will begin with three matches set for Friday night with the South African teams in a familiar position when it comes to the start of their respective campaigns - they will be at a disadvantage due to the absence of international players.
The Springbok game scheduled for Sunday in Perth against Australia put paid to any hopes that doing away with the Rugby Championship this year for the Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series, which ended earlier than the Championship would normally be, would conspire in favour of the local URC teams.
The 10Bet Lions won’t feel it so keenly as they don’t have that many current Boks on their books as they prepare to host URC champions Leinster on Saturday afternoon with their confidence no doubt boosted by their highly competitive showing against the All Blacks a few weeks ago. But the other three teams will feel it as they prepare to play against teams that will have all their international players available.
There are of course two ways of looking at it - the teams that will take the field in the first round will at least have trained together during the pre-season, and a positive spin off of having to go deep into the resource base early doors in the competition does mean that coaches are given a good idea of what they have to work with going forward and it helps to give fringe players game time.
Last year the Stormers started the season as if they had a train to catch and comprehensively outplayed Leinster in Cape Town. That was the night before the Boks played Argentina in Durban, so the Stormers were under-strength. But then so were Leinster, as there several British and Irish Lions players were still on an enforced rest.
STRONG LEINSTER TEAM EXPECTED FOR ELLIS PARK GAME
Leinster won’t be under-strength this time for their game against the Lions, and neither will Connacht, who after upsetting the Stormers’ season in Cape Town a few months ago get a chance to do it again when they host them in Galway on Friday. The Stormers suddenly have more Boks than they used to, with the trio of incoming players Siya Kolisi, Cheslin Kolbe and Wilco Louw being supplemented by new Boks such as Paul de Villiers, while Deon Fourie is now into his second Bok career, but their director of rugby John Dobson has achieved more success than most when it comes to creating depth. And we understand that the Stormers will be boosted this week by the return to his home city of Hashim Pead, the star of the 2025 Junior Bok team and a player who is expected to have a big future in the game.
STORMERS NEED TO DEAL WITH 4G BOGEY
The biggest stumbling block for the Stormers though won’t be that they are under-strength, but the surface they will be playing the game on. The 4G surface that they will encounter at the Sports Ground isn’t one the Stormers have been comfortable on in the past, and they will still have fresh memories of how their quest to finish top of the log was extinguished on 4G surfaces in Cardiff and Belfast last season.
Dobson did though say at the start of the off-season it was one of his team’s work ons, and it will have needed to be as the Stormers’ second game is also on a 4G surface - they play Edinburgh a week after the Connacht game. Unless there’s been a radical shift in the way they approach the artificial surface, the Stormers could be returning from their overseas tour without any points.
The other team that is travelling at the start, the Vodacom Bulls, have a slightly easier start as they head to Parma to play Zebre. The secondary Italian side can be competitive in the early season, but the Bulls should be expected to win.
SHARKS MUST DO TALKING ON THE FIELD
The Hollywoodbets Sharks are the team most in need of improvement after their poor 12th placed finish last season and there will be a lot of eyes on both their team selection and performance in their opening game against the Ospreys at Hollywoodbets Kings Park on Saturday. The 56-man squad named by JP Pietersen last week does appear to have more depth to it and is less Bok heavy than past Sharks squads but the proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating. The Durban rugby public is unlikely to be brought in by talk, for that has happened too often in the past - it is time for the team to do all the talking on the field by producing where it matters most.
When at full strength the Sharks will boast a formidable tight five - Ox Nche, an apparently fit against Bongi Mbonambi and Thomas du Toit in the front row backed up by Eben Etzebeth and Jason Jenkins or Emile van Heerden in the second row. Indeed, if both teams are at full strength by then, the 10 October derby against the Stormers in Cape Town could be quite some game with key Boks up against each other. But first both teams have to negotiate overseas opponents who aren’t hamstrung by rivalling international interests.
FIRST ROUND VODACOM URC FIXTURES
Connacht v DHL Stormers (Galway, Friday 20.45)
Benetton v Dragons (Treviso, Friday 20.45)
Ulster v Edinburgh (Belfast, Friday 20.45)
10Bet Lions v Leinster (Johannesburg, Saturday 13.30)
Hollywoodbets Sharks v Ospreys (Durban, Saturday 16.00)
Munster v Glasgow Warriors (Limerick, Saturday 18.30)
Zebre v Vodacom Bulls (Parma, Saturday 18.30)
Scarlets v Cardiff Rugby (Llanelli, Saturday 20.45)