Sharks made to regret slow start
6 Aug 2012
JON CARDINELLI writes the Sharks will need to replicate the Chiefs’ league phase consistency if they hope to be realistic title contenders in 2013.
The 15-team Super Rugby competition has proved to be far more arduous than it’s 14-side predecessor, and after two seasons some trends have been made patently clear.
The Reds won the Super Rugby title in 2011 and the Chiefs won it in 2012. Both teams topped their respective conferences and both teams finished in the top two on the overall log. Both teams hosted tired opponents in the grand final, opponents that had traversed the Indian Ocean at least twice during the finals series.
Mark Keohane wrote on Friday that the competition format is flawed and that the Sharks should never be expected to beat the Chiefs after such a taxing travel schedule. Keohane argued that the format made a farce of the final concept, and that it would never produce a contest where two teams stood a chance of winning.
That the competition is flawed is plain to see. Should it change? Undoubtedly. Will it change? Not until 2016.
According to Sanzar CEO Greg Peters, the tournament will not expand until 2016 and the format will remain as is for another three seasons until a new broadcast deal is signed.
If a South African team hopes to win the Super Rugby title in the next three years, they will need to finish in the top two. Better yet, they will need to finish top of the league and put themselves into a position to host a grand final.
But there’s more to the winning formula than that. The competition spans February to August, and it isn’t enough that you top the league – you need to progress to the knockouts with the majority of your first-choice players still intact.
This is where the Stormers fell short in 2012. They managed to top the overall league but lost too many key players in the process. They went into that semi-final with a number of rookies and were even forced to play several players out of position in order to field a competitive team.
The Chiefs won 12 out of 16 during the regular season, and while they lost Richard Kahui early in the year, their forwards marched on to the final. It said much for their depth that Sam Cane, the man who is being tipped to succeed Richie McCaw as the All Blacks openside flank, was on the bench in the Hamilton decider.
On paper, there weren’t too many differences between the Chiefs and Sharks after the league stage. They both had scored and conceded a similar amount of tries, and had both embraced a balanced approach. However, what allowed the Chiefs to finish four places ahead of the Sharks was the fact that they had secured two more wins than the Durban franchise.
The Sharks have finished the league in sixth position for the past two seasons, and while there may have been a lot of hype and emotion around their golden run towards the 2012 final, a team is always going to struggle to win the competition from that particular position.
What teams like the Sharks need to start doing is putting together some consistent performances, and maintaining their form throughout the season. If the Chiefs are capable of doing so, why not the Sharks?
The Sharks fell short of the title this year, but ultimately they left themselves with too much to do in the latter stages of the competition. They won just four of their first nine matches and this forced them to play catch-up in the second half of their campaign.
They will regret the loss to the Lions in Johannesburg, although it wasn’t just one result that prevented them of finishing higher on the log. They were too loose at the start of their campaign, and were duly punished by the Bulls and Stormers. There were some spectacular wins such as the victory over the Reds in Durban, but they struggled to win more than two games on the trot.
The ugly win against the Highlanders was the turning point, and the Sharks managed to win six of their last seven league games. In some instances the manner of victory was emphatic (they scored four four-try bonus points during that period) and so there was good reason to believe they could go all the way.
But as the past two seasons have shown, the brand of rugby is not all decisive. The most consistent teams play themselves into a position to host a play-off and thus avoid the draining effects of travel. A more consistent display during the league will help the Sharks avoid this debilitation in future.
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18 Comments
6 Aug 2012, 07:40 am
Point is! Sharks could not make it after they were behind since their negative tactics went out the window!
Easy playing negative when you are in front….ask any stormer supporter!
6 Aug 2012, 08:08 am
Hahahaha… Boom fzzzz POP!!!
Sharks have lost because they DID NOT DESERVE TO BE IN A FINAL!!!
6 Aug 2012, 08:16 am
@Provvas-2: And they call the average Bulls supporter a suurgat. Provvas the sharks have a lot to be proud of and they deserved to be there.
We all knew it was only as a matter of time before the Stormers cardhouse was going to crumble.
6 Aug 2012, 08:21 am
@2….we bitchslapped you sideways when it counted troll, now get over it. Sharks are over Saturdays loss we lost to a better team BOOM !!!
6 Aug 2012, 08:29 am
@Provvas-2: You know what is worse? Having a home semi and a rest and then blow it.
6 Aug 2012, 08:36 am
can’t comprehend how the stormerchiefs can sit on a high horse and claim this as a “victory”? their team got sharksmashed only the week before, and worst was that it was a home semifinal. how embarrassing to lose a home semi when you finish in 1st place with a guaranteed home final! and the stormerchiefs have lost 3 home semis now! eina! sharks proved indisputably to be the best SA team this year! played 3 against the stormers, won 2! in other words stormers were sharksavaged TWICE in 2012! hehehehehehe!
6 Aug 2012, 08:45 am
This yet again reaffirms that the current format for Super rugby does not work, why give teams #5 and 6 a shot at playoff rugby when they have no chance to win the competition?
The sharks played great ruggas in the QF and SF but it was obviouse that they were no longer contenders after the first Chiefs try.
Funny how the most rested player played the worst rugby (Lambie).
Anyway, after the whistle went I kind of wondered why the sharks even bothered to try? All the ygot was two good wins and a thumping.
I blame the Stormers; they should’ve saved the sharks the trouble.
6 Aug 2012, 08:48 am
Sharks were not consistent through the season – so they ended up trying to compete in the final after an unprecedented travel schedule. Nobody’s fault but their own.
What some sour grape Stormers fans seem to forget is there is a little thing called a semi to be won before you entitled to play in the final. Stormers topped the log but whereas the Chiefs managed to win their semi, Stormers again fell short in the final sprint.
6 Aug 2012, 08:50 am
@BreakdownBoy-7: I pretty much agree – I think the playoffs is a waste of time and the top 4 should go through to the semi’s. Don’t think the result would have been any different this year if that was the case
6 Aug 2012, 09:09 am
@BreakdownBoy-7: Even though its not a great system you must remember it was the same for all the teams, also surely your team having ended 1st should be whipping the team ending 6th? having gone through traveling of hell etc etc etc??
Mate the best team won the Super15 this year,rather admit that.
6 Aug 2012, 09:24 am
@sharks_lover-10: It’s not that they won, it’s rather how they won. It was embarrasing for SA rugby, having three teams in the playoffs and then have the final be such a failure, why a failure, well I switched off the tv when it was 3-20, so I guess a large portion of TV viewers did the same, not good for the TV rights.
The chiefs deserved to win, the sharks were handicapped by the system.
6 Aug 2012, 09:38 am
The format certainly has to be changed after 2015. From next year they should in this format allow the teams that play in the final to have a rest week after the semi. Makes sense as probably one team will always be travelling from SA or NZ.
Sharks draw was tough to start with. To play Stormers and Bulls away from home was a tough ask. Both games were very close could have gone either way but that how it goes. If we had beaten the Lions and won against the Tahs we would have held a final at Kings Park. A pity we never got those wins. At least we made a storming charge to the final. The travel was a killer and really hope no team ever has to go through that again in the next 2 years until they change this format. Players will eventually leave and play their rugby in Europe. None will want to do this kind of travel.
6 Aug 2012, 10:01 am
play well enough in the league stages to EARN a home semi-final, WIN that semi-final and back yourself to go all out in the final – whether @ home or away – and win the title.
fortune favours the consistent in this comp!
how many times did we hear “it’s still early days” “this and the other team still have to tour so they’ll fumble too” “that team’s bubble will POP too” “if that team loses to the other one we will surge up the log to claim top spot after our bye” “we had a kak draw and played away games 1st”
no more excuses.
6 Aug 2012, 10:26 am
So much for “crime-free NZ”:
Chiefs coach robbed during Super rugby final: www . superxv.com/news/super15_rugby_news.asp?id=36087
6 Aug 2012, 11:47 am
The sharks were handicapped by their own inability to win during the pool stages. While they were certainly at a disadvantage, I don’t think this was a forgone conclusion at all. If the Sharks had a better start and managed to put the Chiefs under pressure, they would have had good chance.
Also, if the Chiefs vs Sharks was a forgone conclusion, you would have expected the Stormers vs Sharks to be a forgone conclusion too, but we all know how that ended.
The stats are skewed since what it’s really showing is that the team which does the best over the entire season is the same team which usually wins the finals. This shouldn’t be shocking news to anyone.
6 Aug 2012, 12:13 pm
@bokfan1-14: Must have been some sharks supporters in town
6 Aug 2012, 13:05 pm
As a Sharks supporter…
PLEASE SCRAP team #5 and #6 and also this 1 team from each country nonsense.
Over the whole season we beat the Stormers twice in 3 matches. Argument over.
7 Aug 2012, 06:30 am
1st round of Playoffs should be on Friday pms and SemiFs should follow Sat or Sunday pms the next week – the extra 24hrs of player recovery should be paramount over the tv schedule.
There should then be 2 weeks until the Final. Allows player preparation and injury recovery. And allows a huge increase in touring rugby fan numbers with the home venue allotting no less than 15% seat allocation, thereby better atmosphere and tourist-$ cash injection. Also encourages greater advertising/sponsor opportunities ala SuperBowl.
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