Cape Town – When Jan-Hendrik Wessels arrived for his press conference yesterday, he sported a cut on his lip which was all shades of blue and purple.
It was a painful reminder of what the Blue Bulls had endured in their 63-15 Currie Cup disaster against the Pumas last Sunday.
But despite the growing concern about their form, particularly at Loftus Versfeld, the 21-year-old hooker doesn’t believe that there is a major problem brewing in the Bulls kraal.
“I don’t think there is something big wrong. I think if we could’ve scored a maul try against the Lions, we could’ve won the game – and if we could’ve scored the maul try against the Stormers at the end,” the former Junior Springbok front-ranker said.
“So, losing a game by five points is a small margin. Obviously losing by 40 points at the weekend is not good… It wasn’t a moment in which we lost the game, but a few sequences of moments where we lost the game that built up.
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“I don’t think there is anything bad in the camp, or that it’s going terrible at the moment, or that there’s something wrong. You look at a lot of stuff when you’re losing, but I don’t think there’s something wrong.
“Individually as players and as a group at the Bulls, we need to come together and fix what’s wrong. I don’t think there’s a big thing that’s wrong, if you understand what I’m saying. I just think it’s individuals…
“It looks bad, as the record stands at the moment, but I think it’s small stuff that we can turn around in the camp and maybe fix at the weekend.”
But Wessels did pinpoint a few issues that they are addressing ahead of Friday night’s blockbuster showdown with Western Province at Loftus (7.05pm kickoff)
“It was a difficult weekend… You have to start the week over. We won’t look back too much on what happened last weekend, but we looked at it on Monday and have to ensure we don’t make the same mistakes again,” he said.
“We gave them a lot of loose ball, and went into a very loose game against them, which counted in their favour and was difficult for us, as we said we didn’t want to do that.
“We had a lot of turnovers, penalties and scrums that we gave them to play from, which put our defence under pressure. We must also look at ourselves as individual players… where we could have been better for the team.”
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Province carried on where the Stormers left off in the URC by dispatching the Lions 44-28 at Ellis Park last Saturday.
So, it seems as if the altitude on the highveld won’t hold any fears for the Capetonians, and Wessels warned his teammates about allowing WP to feast off turnovers.
“The small errors we made in sequences put us on the back foot and gave them (the Pumas) easy points, and they built on that. When you are 20 points down and start to throw the ball around, and taking chances – and those chances don’t come off – you will take more chances,” he said.
“We didn’t want to give them loose ball on the weekend, but we did and played into their hands. They have a good back-field, and we said that they can kick long, and we gave them opportunities to put us under pressure in our half. So, it’s mistakes that we made, and we live with the consequences of that.
“If we can stop them (WP) from doing what the Pumas did against us, as they are also very unpredictable and play with loose ball – they can do anything from anything.
“Our defence system needs to be in place, and we just need to go out with the plan that the coaches give us this week. It’s the same as the Pumas: if we give them a lot of ball, they are going to create a lot of opportunities from nothing.
“So, I think if we can get that right and play to our strengths – and not make silly mistakes that give them opportunities, it would be a good weekend.”
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