By Gavin Rich.
The performance of fullback Aphelele Fassi and the desire showed by his team when they needed to score two tries in the last minutes to clinch a bonus point were the standouts for coach Sean Everitt of the Cell C Sharks’ 37-20 win over the Scarlets in Durban on Friday night.
The 17-point winning margin flattered the Sharks and Everitt readily admitted afterwards that his team was under the pump for long periods of a game that the visitors could easily have won had they been just a little more clinical with their finishing in a dominant first half.
At the same time, the Sharks did play a role in preventing the Scarlets from accumulating the points they should have when they had territorial ascendancy, and that speaks to the character that Everitt referred to and which was again in evidence in the final minutes.
“It was obviously a massive win for us as far as the logs are concerned,” said Everitt after a full house of points win where the four try bonus was clinched with Marius Louw’s try off the final move of the game several minutes after the hooter.
“The other South African teams will be favoured to get five points as well from their games so if we keep doing that we stay ahead in the Shield (conference). The character we showed in teh last 10 minutes was amazing. It was fantastic to get those two tries in the last eight minutes when we showed great determination.”
It is that kind of determination that distinguishes the winning teams from the also-rans, and it will not have escaped Everitt that this was the second successive game where the Sharks scored their fourth try at the end of the game. What was also impressive though was their resilience when the energetic and motivated Scarlets were pounding them in the first half.
“I think there were moments in the game when we performed well and what was particularly good for us was the way we defended in the long periods when they were camped in our 22. We were really good defensively and dominated the collisions in that area of the field,” he said.
“It was obviously also great for us to see the way our set piece dominated later in the game. Full credit to our bench players who came on and helped us get dominance in the scrums.”
Ultimately it was a combination of the Sharks’ first half defensive effort, and a slice or two of luck, plus the late game scrumming and the X-factor performance of Fassi that won the Sharks the game. Everitt admitted that it was Fassi’s second half try that was the game changer and match winner for his team, as once the fullback had scored the Sharks were re-energised.
“Aphelele was fantastic under the high ball and I thought he turned in a world class performance, “said Everit
“We’ve got to get our game management right, particularly in Durban, and we didn’t manage the game well when the play was between the two 10 metre lines. But Aphelele is playing really great rugby at the moment and this was his second successive man of the match award. He did turn the match on its head when Jayden (Hendrikse) kicked the ball through for him.”
But while Fassi did well individually the Sharks coach would probably be the first to admit that when it comes to synchronising between forwards and backs it was again a poor performance and it was notable that while he was polite to the player when answering a question about Curwin Bosch’s performance, he also used the word “inconsistent”.
While Bosch did start featuring more as an attacking threat when the game had opened up and the Sharks pack was completely dominant and the team was on the front foot, for the first three quarters of the game he was again a team weakness rather than a strength and flyhalf is clearly a position that requires some scrutiny from a selection viewpoint going forward.
The Sharks’ next game is against Parma Zebre at Hollywoodbets Park next Saturday.