The Vodacom Bulls will head into this year’s Vodacom Super Rugby series with only one warm-up game under their belts.
The Bulls, who will face the Stormers in their pre-season friendly in Polokwane on 1 February, have decided that this will be their only warm-up game to prepare for the Southern Hemisphere tournament.
SuperSport – Brenden Nel
On the same day their second stringers will face off with the Lions in a curtain-raiser, giving the entire squad a chance to have a run before the season begins.
Bulls coach Frans Ludeke believes the ploy is the correct one as it will alter the team’s training sessions to be more “game-focused” so that they can be ready for the start of the season.
“We prefer it that way,” Ludeke told supersport.com, “we would rather have enough time to prepare for the season and this has worked for us in the past.”
This is in contrast with the other Super Rugby franchises who will be playing more games in their build-up to the season.
The Cheetahs, for instance, will be playing three warm-up games. They will have their first outing against Griquas in Bloemfontein on 17 January, before heading to Port Elizabeth to face the Southern Kings on 26 January. Their third game will be against the Pumas on 2 February in Parys.
The Lions will start their road back to Super Rugby with a warm-up game against the Leopards on 24 January at Ellis Park. They then face the Kings on 1 February at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth before finishing their preparations against the Sharks at Ellis Park on 7 February, a week before the competition begins.
Down in Cape Town, the Stormers will not only face the Bulls in their pre-season, but also the Kings (7 February) and Boland (14 February). The Stormers have a bye in the first round of the competition and will thus face Boland while the other teams start their campaign.
Apart from their game against the Lions, the Sharks have thus far only confirmed one other pre-season game – their big clash against Saracens in London on 25 January, where no less than 12 Boks are in their squad to make the trip up north.