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Bulls look to strengthen starting line-up for Munster challenge

rugby15 April 2025 07:25
By:Brenden Nel
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Vodacom Bulls © Gallo Images

The Vodacom Bulls will be looking forward to fielding a much stronger side as they resume their Vodacom United Rugby Championship action this weekend against Irish side Munster in Limerick.

After the disappointment of their late fightback against Edinburgh, exiting the EPCR Challenge Cup race, the Bulls now only have their own run in the URC to concentrate on, and their next two weeks will be crucial to see how high up the table they can finish.

This game against Munster - who beat them last year at Loftus Versfeld - is a massive one for the Bulls, especially as next week they also face defending champions Glasgow Warriors on week three and four of their tour.

And for the Bulls there are a lot of positives as a number of players are likely to return to the starting line-up this week. While the team had their fair share of positives from the tour thus far, the strong bench they picked against Edinburgh almost did enough to win the game after a horror first half.

But many of those players are likely to return to the starting line-up this week to solidify the Bulls cause.

Johan Goosen at flyhalf is fit and ready again to play, and showed good form in the second half against Edinburgh. Canan Moodie, the Bok flyer, looked sensational in his time on the field and is also likely to come back into the starting line-up.

Up front it wouldn’t be untoward to see Jan-Hendrik Wessels and Johan Grobbelaar both swap into the front row and the composition of the loose trio may well be up for debate after last weekend’s performance.

Embrose Papier is also likely to get a look in at the starting line-up as the Bulls start to fine tune for their run in towards the playoffs. There is also no news yet of Cobus Wiese, the robust lock who was likely to be back just before the start of the tour but hasn’t been brought back to the field yet.

The secrecy surrounding the playing group means there is no indication if Wiese is back yet, but if he is, he would likely start from the bench. There would be a strong argument for giving Rynhardt Ludwig a start at seven this week.

White acknowledged the team’s reinforcements would mean changes.

“A lot of guys are coming back now, and they’ll enjoy the fact that they’ve got some game time and played well. We’re still very disappointed with the loss because I think people realise that the Bulls want to win every time we play in a competition.

“That’s why we brought the team we did.”

White said he expected the second half performance against Edinburgh to filter through into the performance this week.

What I expect next week is that we kick on from the second half in terms of what we did. It’s not going to get any easier for us as a group, with Munster and Glasgow away.”

White added that Goosen was purposely given time off the bench to return to his best form, and now that he has - in the coach’s eyes - shown that form, he is likely to start.

“The thought process was very simple: he’s our number-one number 10. He’s come back from a long injury, and I basically blooded him as he played 20 minutes last week and 40 minutes this week.

“Ruan Nortjé is the same: 20 minutes, then 40 last week and 60 this week. That’s all part of being aware that not everyone is 80-minute game-ready.

“But you know how much I rate him (Goosen), how much I talk about him in terms of how we want to play. So, to have him for 40 minutes where our backs were against the wall, I think he showed everybody how important he is to us at the Bulls.”

The Bulls will name their side for the clash on Friday.

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