Bulls will draw on past defeats to spur them on in semifinal

The Vodacom Bulls have been at this point before, but this time they believe it is different and their side is a lot closer to the finished item than when they faced the Irish juggernaut Leinster in an emotional semifinal last season.

This time around it is the galacticos of the Hollywoodbets Sharks that await them, a team just as laden with national players as the Irish team and who have beaten them twice already this season that will arrive at Loftus to test their title aspirations.

But the Bulls believe they can draw on the experiences of last season and their two final losses in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship to make sure they go all the way this season.

Still, though, there is an element of doubt that always creeps in, and White was asked what more he could do to make sure the team gets over the line.

A tough question to answer for the World Cup winning coach who has had success with other sides but still needs to get this Bulls side into Champion mode.

There are few that will argue that the team has improved with every season and has built a squad that is among the best in the competition, but sport is about winning, and two finals losses in three years is a stat that bites.

WHITE IRRITATED BY ARTICLE

White was also irritated after a website wrote an article about the Bulls being “chokers” - not only because they lost two finals, but the ridiculousness of the argument stretched back to the beginnings of Super Rugby and their failures there until 2007, when they became the first SA team to do so.

White didn’t mention that it was strange that the same standard wasn’t being applied to other teams - like the Sharks, but did say that his management team were doing everything in their power to see that the team goes all the way this year.

“It's a difficult question for me to answer because there is no right. Someone asked me the other day, I read an article about being chokers,” White said.

“I've got a fulltime psychologist that works with our team. So what more can you give a team if the label is you're a choker or the perception is you're a choker?

"What you want as a coach is you want to make sure that when they get these opportunities to be in these big games, that they learn all the things that didn't work and all the things that did work.

“If you tell a golfer - careful of the water on the left-hand side in a golf hole, chances are he will hit it in the water. So it's one of those things I don't think you need to talk about. I think that you need to encourage the other side of things, the positivity.

“Where we were, what we've done, who we've played against, why we didn't pull it through, what we were good at, that's the way I'm seeing it now. We want to play in the final and we want to win the final. And whatever we've learned along the way.

FINISHED STRONG

“Today we finished strong. Today our scrum was stronger in the second half than it was in the second half of other games in the last four years. So that's why when I say sometimes it's me.

"Sometimes I need to look at what we do, who came on, when did he play, how much time did he get, who did he play with. And I'm happy that after four years, I'm happy to put reserves on. I'm happy to put another front row on.

“I'm happy to give confidence to a guy like Keagan Johannes who's run at 10 and will continue to kick for goal even though he feels as though he's not striking it properly. So I suppose what I'm trying to say to you in a roundabout way is we don't want to talk about that. What happened in the past, it's irrelevant other than the fact that it's got to help you.

“It doesn't matter. Next week we're in the semifinal again and that means everything we need to do this week is what we did in that semifinal. We beat Leinster away in the semifinal. We beat Leinster away in the semifinal there.

SEMIFINALS ARE GOOD WEEKS

“Maybe the semifinals have been the best weeks in the years that I've been coaching. Maybe that's something we've just got to go and find what worked and then make sure that becomes the best week again because then we'll get the same result.”

White said negativity was not something you wanted to concentrate on in a semifinal week.

“It isn't something that we talk about. It's funny, when you coach, you don't want to use words like lose and remember this because I think that brings all the negativity to the thought process instead of the positivity, which is we're in the semifinal.

“At this point in time there's only two South African sides left in this competition and the Bulls again, and I say it again, are at the top of the table.

“So what more can I ask from these young guys?”

White smiled when he said part of the confidence going into the semifinal was the all-round strength of the Bulls’ game at the moment. Against Edinburgh they didn’t use their maul - partly because the referee Adam Jones refused to reward them when the Scottish side sacked it illegally.

And that ability to adapt is what they believe will count in their favour in the semifinal this weekend.

FIND LOVE ELSEWHERE

“If you're not going to get love for mauling and you're not going to get penalties for sacking late, well, then you need to play away from there. There were times where I thought we were running with them with a maul and the thing collapsed and it was sacking.

“That's fine. It just means that as a player and as a group you've got to go right. If we don't get love here, we need to find love somewhere else.

“That's what I quite enjoyed, is that we went from what we were good at and what we thought we could do into how we wouldn't have done that three years ago. We would have carried on mauling, kept moaning, kept saying the referee's not rewarding us, kept making a reason why we can't get the ball out of that first breakdown.

“So it wasn't, I think it's something that we've spoken about over four years. You've got to go into a game with an idea and a plan and if that doesn't work, you've got to find another way.

“You cannot be dumb enough just to think that you're eventually going to get what you think you're going to get. We caught them on the basis they thought we were going to maul.

"Even in the 22, I'm sure you noticed we went off the top and went straight to Harold (Vorster) because teams are expecting us to maul five yards out, you know.

“That variation, we know when we defend that it's much tougher to defend when a team does different things than just put their heads down and maul.”

The Bulls will know the Sharks will have a plan for whatever they come with and will test them to the limits. The spectre that the Sharks have won both derbies this year - including the last game at Loftus - will be back of their minds.

But they know they will need to find a way to win - or the season will be over and the disappointment will be back.