By Gavin Rich.
Thomas du Toit might be missed for his forthright approach to media interviews when he leaves for Bath as much as he will be by the Cell C Sharks for his massive contributions in the front row. Many players duck the question about the emotion of playing a farewell game, preferring to say they will think about it after the final whistle has blown, but the big forward didn’t do that.
There may well be a call-up for the likes of Du Toit and the team’s current skipper Siya Kolisi in the Carling Currie Cup after this. The Vodacom United Rugby Championship, which reaches the conclusion of the league stage at the weekend, ends with the final in mid-May. The Currie Cup final is in the second half of June. It is unclear at this point if the provinces will have the use of their Springboks, and if they do, there might be another round of farewells then.
However, when it comes to the Sharks playing in an international competition like the URC, Saturday’s clash with Munster will certainly be Du Toit’s final game for the Sharks at HollywoodBets Kings Park. And Kolisi’s too. The Sharks are marketing it as a farewell, and that doesn’t bother Du Toit, who says he’s felt a fair bit of emotion over the past two weeks as the reality dawns that this will be the last time he represents the Sharks at this level of competition at the ground he has called home ever since he moved to Durban from the Cape fresh out of school.
“There is no timeline to it and I imagine it will be when we get knocked out of or win the competition, but this will definitely be my last URC game at Kings Park,” agreed Du Toit.
Naive to think you can ignore emotion
The Sharks can’t finish higher than sixth on the URC log, which would make it virtually impossible for them to be at home at any stage of the URC play-off phase. At the very least, it is an unrealistic prospect, so Du Toit has accepted that Saturday will be the day he says goodbye.
“I think it would be a bit naive not to think about it and work through those emotions. So I have definitely been processing it for the last two weeks or so,” said the Springbok prop.
“Last week it did settle on me a bit. I realised that a decade was coming to an end at a union that I have really tried to be loyal to. It is sinking in. There is an exciting season in my life, and all of our lives still to come, but I am hurting about saying goodbye. And there will be emotion at the weekend. My job is to be a rugby player, and I want to leave the jersey in a better state than when I got it.”
Siya has left his mark on Sharks
Kolisi is the Bok captain and could easily steal the headlines for Saturday’s day of farewells, but the flank spent most of his South African career at Western Province and the Stormers two years seasons ago. For him, his Sharks stint hasn’t been as long as Du Toit’s has. However Du Toit says that Kolisi has contributed enough to the Sharks to leave an indelible mark on the franchise and union once he has departed to play in France.
“Siya is a natural leader and one of his traits is that he gets along with most people, and he has brought that personality and inclusiveness to the Sharks,” he said.
“The big thing about Siya is that in his personal relationships he is not superficial. Obviously he can’t get to know everyone and get close to everyone on that level, but he’s been a great personality to have around and been good for connecting the team to the community. I am hoping that this isn’t the end of it and that I get a chance to continue to work with Siya going forward.”
Thomas is a breed that is becoming rare
Du Toit is part of a breed of player that is starting to become more rare in the professional era. Apart from a short stint at Munster in 2016/2017, where he accumulated six caps for the Irish province and his time there didn’t overlap with Sharks commitments as it was during the off-season, the 27-year-old has been firmly committed to the Sharks ever since leaving Paarl Boys High at the end of 2013.
His first season with the Sharks was Jake White’s season as the director of rugby at the Durban franchise and the year that they won the South African Conference in Super Rugby for the first and only time. So when Du Toit says he’s determined in his remaining time at the Sharks to leave the jersey in a better place than it was when he arrived, he’s setting himself quite an exacting challenge.
“This is the moment to go all out to leave the jersey in a better place and a higher standard than when I arrived, that is very important to me,” said the member of the 2019 Bok Rugby World Cup winning squad.
“I am not a guy who can be at a union for 10 years and then just throw it away. This is a very emotional time for me but I want to play the best I can and do the best I can in what remains of my time with the Sharks.”
Munster will be a different team this time
He gets that opportunity against the one other provincial team he has represented in the past decade, and says after watching Munster play well against the Stormers last week he knows the Sharks are going to have to be at the top of their game if they are going to get the win they need to qualify for next season’s Heineken Champions Cup.
“Munster are not going to be the same team they were when we beat them in the Champions Cup (round of 16 tie). That won’t be the case because of the way we played against them last time. They would have learned from that and they’ve had hard and tough conversations in their camp because of that last game (in Durban).
“I thought they played an unbelievable game against the Stormers last week, so their coach clearly made a point of getting it right after our game against them. They fixed what went wrong against us. We won’t score 50 against them again, although if we do that will be great and we will take it.”
WIN OR BUST ON SATURDAY
Du Toit said he and his teammates know that it is win or bust against Munster. Even if they do win, a Connacht win on the same day against Glasgow Warriors if it also coincides with a Vodacom Bulls win over Leinster will leave the Sharks short of their objective of making the Champions Cup. But they won’t have a chance if they don’t win.
“We want to end within the top seven (the requirement for Champions Cup qualification), as high as we possibly can, and we are not looking at further than what we can create,” said the bulky front-row forward.
“We know we need to win first and foremost and then we can worry about a bonus point,” he added.
To do that, Du Toit reckons the Sharks need to repeat the forward set-piece dominance of the 50-35 win over Munster four weeks ago as well as be on point at the breakdown points.
“The breakdown points will be very important in this game, Munster showed against the Stormers how much they have improved there,”he said.
“They targeted the Stormers breakdown and their tackle completion was high. That meant they slowed the Stormers ball down, and their own ball on attack was relatively quick. Their set piece was also functioning really well against a big Stormers pack and they really stood up well to that challenge. Then there were some magic moments and good attack that won them the game.”
The Sharks team for the Munster game will be announced on Friday.