Trip to Lyon can build Sharks depth for URC challenge

Gerbrandt Grobler’s return to the playing field is likely to be the headline part of the Hollywoodbets Sharks’ trip to France to face Lyon in an EPCR Challenge Cup match that has much less significance for the Durbanites than last season’s games in the secondary European competition.

With a tough two match Vodacom United Rugby Championship tour coming up in a fortnight for the Sharks, and it could decide whether they finish in the top four of that competition or not, the main focus for Sharks coach John Plumtree right now is to ensure his team is as strong and as ready as possible for that trip.

The word is that he hasn’t taken any of his top Springboks to France for Sunday’s game. Instead they are back in Durban preparing for the forthcoming URC tour, and that includes Eben Etzebeth and Aphelele Fassi. Plumtree has already said that he wouldn’t risk either in France even though he acknowledges they need game time, but both of them are ready to play and would if they were selected.

The return of Grobler to the playing field after an absence of six months though is significant, for adding the well travelled 33-year-old to a second row mix that will include Etzebeth, Jason Jenkins and Emile van Heerden for the final furlong of the URC campaign will enormously enhance their chances of success in what is considered the bread and butter competition.

Grobler and Etzebeth together have been a winning second row combination for the Sharks so you could say that this is the first part of the jigsaw being put back in place for the Challenge Cup champions.

Although they are the title holders, the Sharks have no danger of dropping out of the top eight in the URC so they don’t need the Challenge Cup to qualify for the next Investec Champions Cup like was the case last year, when they were also-rans in the URC from a very early stage. So they are seeing the competition this time around for what it is, a consolation competition for sides that don’t make it in the elite competition.

Get to know Lyon Olympique Universitaire Rugby ahead of Sunday’s clash 🙌#ChallengeCup #LYOvSHA pic.twitter.com/yR4bhquL3Z

— The Sharks (@SharksRugby) April 2, 2025

The Challenge Cup is something of a unique competition in the sense that it is not one that any team would want to win successively. To win it two years in a row would mean that their campaign in the higher competition, the Champions Cup, went awry, and that was the case for the Sharks this season. Their long term goal though is to win the Champions Cup, so it is important they are in that competition going forward.

But that doesn’t mean the Sharks team that plays this Challenge Cup round of 16 game won’t be going all out for victory. It just means they won’t do it while risking their top players, who have more important business coming up, and defeat will not be viewed as a disaster. Indeed, it appears expected, for the Sharks appear to be regarding next week as a bye week to be spent preparing for the URC tour in Durban. If they do beat Lyon they might have to stay on in Europe, depending on who wins this week’s game between the Ospreys and the Scarlets, for a Challenge Cup quarterfinal.

The URC tour starts the following week against Sean Everitt’s Edinburgh and the Sharks intend starting that mission by flying out of Durban, with it quite possible that another of the coaches might take charge in the Lyon game with Plumtree staying back to prepare the URC squad for their mission.

The best result for the Sharks in Lyon might be an honourable defeat where individual players play well. A good performance against Lyon should help the fringe players and increase their chances of playing in the crunch URC games, or at the very least boost their confidence should they be called up in the business end games in the URC because of injury.

So looking on the positive side, although a trip overseas might appear to be the last thing the Sharks need right now given what is coming next, the journey to France will not be in vain regardless of the result if they get a strengthening of the depth they have available to them out of the trip.