Connacht take no bull in big win over stunned Springboks

Connacht 34

Vodacom Bulls 7

Rob Murphy at the Sportsground

OUTSMARTING your opponent is the name of the game in any sport and both on the field and off the field on Friday evening, Connacht had their South African opponents from Pretoria tied up in knots as they tried to make sense of a five try to one drubbing.

All this in a game where the visitors had had most of the possession in the first half, but also in a game where they were completely blown away during a pulsating second half.

Losing to Leinster in the Aviva Stadium, as they had done a week earlier, is one thing but losing in the wind and rain in Galway is a whole other thing for the best side in South Africa, well at least that is how they saw it.

In the pre-game pitch side TV interview, Jake White had spoken about Connacht being a side made up largely of Leinster guys who couldn’t get contracts with their home province. This wasn’t even Rassie Erasmus style mind games, this was simply ill informed inaccurate nonsense from the visiting coach.

After the game, White grumbled about the pitch having a slope in it. The former South African World Cup winning coach has had better days when it comes to respecting opponents but again, this was not the kind of pre-meditated mind games that South African Director of rugby Erasmus made headlines with during the Lions test series last summer, this was more just the words of a coach who seemed to be a little disorientated after all of his plans had gone up in smoke.

South African rugby is winning rugby at the moment. The Springboks beat New Zealand in Queensland at the weekend with Bulls front row players Trevor Nyakane and Johan Grobbelaar, flanker Duane Vermeulan (who is leaving for Ulster soon) and veteran out half and Lions series drop goal hero Morne Steyne all part of the squad. That’s four absentees, hardly a major disruption for a fixture in the west of Ireland. Well that’s what they thought clearly.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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