Jake White believes the four South African franchises need to adapt to the refereeing and different law interpretations to compete successfully in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship.
The Vodacom Bulls, Lions, Sharks and Stormers completed their respective four-match tours of Europe this past weekend and will return home with a collective total of four wins, one draw and 11 defeats from 16 games played.
Form notwithstanding, there had been several contentious officiating decisions in every one of those 16 matches, with the South Africans particularly penalised at the breakdown.
Commenting on the state of the officiating, White said the South African teams’ players have to adjust to the refereeing and have to play to the whistle.
“We’ve been speaking about this for four weeks, since we got here – it’s about adapting to the referee. It’s about understanding it’s a very different competition … you don’t get given anything here,” White said during the post-match media conference this past Saturday night.
“So, to be fair, we did get rewarded a few times with Bismarck [du Plessis] – I thought he was really good at the breakdown tonight as well. So, I suppose you take the good with the bad.
“I just think we couldn’t get our hands on the ball. When we did keep it just before half time, we looked like scoring, and got some great gainline. At the end there, we kept the ball for phase after phase, and it shows that we’ve got to trust the fact that we want to play.
“It was difficult. What happened there is that we weren’t getting any joy at the breakdown. Every time we carried the ball two phases, we generally got it turned over or gave a penalty away.
“So, it felt like at times that we were sort of getting strangled by playing [attacking rugby]. Typically, the naivety and inexperience is then like a catch-22, because you know you’ve got to keep playing to win, but you also know that you are not getting any joy by going for two, three phases, because you are turning the ball over.”
The Bulls claimed a single win on tour, over Cardiff, but lost against Leinster, Connacht and Edinburgh.
Yet, despite the unsatisfactory results, White is adamant there were enough encouraging signs across those four performances to believe that his team can beat Munster and Scarlets at Loftus Versfeld on 27 November and 3 December.
“We are still putting the building blocks together. It doesn’t mean that the players who are there aren’t good enough. It’s something that we have to work on. The only way we are going to learn is to keep putting them in those situations and finding ways that they can handle those pressure situations,” the former Bok coach said.
“So, I don’t want to sound like everything is doom and gloom. I’m not happy that we lost this game, and I am not happy that we gave them a 14-point start but, gee … a try-saving tackle on Lionel Mapoe’s jersey in the last play of the game … otherwise we score and it’s 17 all.
“The Stormers came here last week and had a 20-all draw, so it shows you that it’s not an easy place to come and play, and it’s not an easy competition to get away wins.
“You are going to have to work really hard. We are going to have to make sure that when people come to Loftus, we have to make sure it’s exactly the same for visiting teams.”
Photo: Archive
