The Sharks host the Cheetahs at Mr Price Kings Park in the first of two Currie Cup games today. Top spot on the log is up for grabs after Griquas stunned the Lions last night, with the winner of this clash owning top spot.
The Sharks will be happy to be back at home after their miserable outing at Loftus last weekend, while also welcoming back Springbok discard Keegan Daniel to bolster their loose trio. We also see Pieter Dixon in action on South African soil for the first time since leaving the Cape for Bath.
The Cheetahs have lost Johan Goosen to the national setup, just as he returned to action, with Sias Ebersohn returning to the starting line-up with no other flyhalf left in the province. His partnership with Sarel Pretorius should be telling in the overall performance of the team.
Sharks: 15 Louis Ludik, 14 Odwa Ndungane , 13 Paul Jordaan , 12 Meyer Bosman , 11 S’bura Sithole, 10 Riaan Viljoen, 9 Charl McLeod, 8 Keegan Daniel, 7 Jean Deysel (captain), 6 Jacques Botes, 5 Anton Bresler, 4 Steven Sykes, 3 Wiehahn Herbst, 2 Monde Hadebe, 1 Dale Chadwick.
Replacements: 16 Pieter Dixon, 17 Julian Redelinghuys, 18 Jandré Marais, 19 Francois Kleinhans, 20 Cobus Reinach, 21 Marius Joubert, 22 Rosko Specman.
Free State Cheetahs: 15 Hennie Daniller, 14 Nico Scheepers, 13 Robert Ebersohn (captain), 12 Barry Geel, 11 Raymond Rhule, 10 Sis Ebersohn, 9 Sarel Pretorius, 8 Lucas Floors, 7 Pieter Labuschagne, 6 Frans Viljoen, 5 Izak van der Westhuizen, 4 Andries Ferreira, 3 Marcel van der Merwe, 2 Hercu Liebenberg, 1 Schalk van der Merwe.
Replacements: 16 Elandré Huggett, 17 Ross Geldenhuys, 18 Waltie Vermeulen, 19 Davon Raubenheimer, 20 Tewis de Bruyn, 21 Phillip Snyman, 22 Ryno Benjamin.

Go SHARKS
Sky Sports is showing the match! Yeah!!! As long as Sky keeps this up, I am a happy man! Can’t wait to go back to South Africa though. This match will be a cracker. We miss so much experience and Cheetahs have a lot of players who can determine a match.
I am just happy Brussow is not playing. He singlehandedly beat us at the breakdown for 40 minutes in the Super Rugby match between the two at Kings Park.
Coolish day in Durbam with quite a wind making things tricky for the kickers..
I feel much more confident now that Keegan is playing.
Never thought I’d say this but: I am so happy Bosman is back from injury 😉
Go SpiderShark!!
Is Riaan Smit injured or just dropped?
@JarsonX (Comment 7) :
Injured for the remainder of the season..
Injured. If I’m not mistaken, he is out for the rest of the year. It gives Sias Ebersohn a chance…
Man! Sky Sports is not showing the match now. Anyone have a decent stream for me?
Go Sharks
@Richard Ferguson (Comment 8) : @TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 9) : There goes another trade 🙄
Sharks keeping the Cheets pinned in their half……
@JarsonX (Comment 12) : I’ve used half my trades and still have something something like 5 none players…..
Bosman puts a penalty kick thru to get the Sharks on the scoreboard…
Sharks 3 – 0 Cheetahs
6 min
a knock from the Cheets save the Shark a few meters from the try-line
Sias makes it all square again…. 13 min
awesome stuff from Keegan……
@Franshark (Comment 17) : apologies that was scheepers
good brake from Bosman
Lively play from McLeod…..
Sharks loose the ball on the floor, actually conceded a penalty for holding on.
Try Jordaan or not?
Paul Jordaan try, TMO for obstruction, obstruction called, no try….
Fair call…
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 10) : http://www.vipbox.tv/watch/71038/1/natal-sharks-vs-free-state-cheetahs-live-stream-online.html
Crap link, but the only one I could find 😥
That was a bad call, no way the Sharks guilty for pulling that mall down….
Neverless the Cheets gets a penalty and go ahead
Sharks 3 – 6 Cheetahs
25 min
Sias drop goal…..
Sharks 3 – 9 Cheetahs
27 min
Thanks man. That has to do it for now. Downloading the match later this weekend and will watch it again. Sharks just sloppy on attack.
Numbingly shit rugby
The rev’s harms shooting in the air, does he know someone wants to shoot him…
pathetic call……
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 30) : Seriously pissed off with the useless Sky mofos!! 👿
Its because of his stupid calls that the players are getting worked up…..
Who is ref?
Penalty for the Sharks… straight in front…..
Botes makes a mistake loosing the ball and Sarel picked it up and dives over for a try…
Rasti Rashivanga (or something)… He does not know the rules as well as we would like. Sharks throwing it away now.
Sharks 6 – 16 Cheetahs
37 min
Okay, and now we concede a try after Pretorius is offside at the breakdown. Before McLeod has his hands on the ball, Sarel is moving past the ruck. Bad reffing again
oh….. no Rhule try…..
Sharks 6 – 23 Cheetahs
39 min
🙁
Fuck this. I´m not bothering.
Forward pass and another try oppertunity goes begging….. come on Sharks
Shocking Sharkies, I would by scared to go to the changeroom.
Sharks 6 – 23 Cheetahs
FT
@Franshark (Comment 48) : Fulltime you say 😉
So many handling errors cos the forwards keep cropping up in midfield and outside. Wake up!
Things arent looking good right now 😕
And again! Get out the backline!
Sharks over, but held up
Viljoen over…..
@Franshark (Comment 48) : [email protected]JarsonX (Comment 49) : 😳
Ball goes wide to a BACK and we finally score. 🙄
Sharks 13 – 21 Cheetahs
48 min
Odwa always messes up! Come on! Kick the freaking ball when 3 men are running at you in your own 22!!!
Somewhere I gave the Cheets two xstra points…..
PK Scheepers
Sharks 13 – 24 Cheetahs
55 min
Come on Sharks!!!
There it is, now we lost it. Come on!!! On attack we cannot even hold on to the ball…. This is really a disgrace. We are playing against a team that has guys like Andries Ferreira, Nico Scheepers and Hennie ‘Tortoise’ Daniller…
29-13…
@Franshark (Comment 54) : Yay!
what the hell…… Scheepers try…. TMO
try awarded
Sharks 13 – 29 Cheetahs
56 min
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 62) : No! 🙁
Useless schoolboy rugby.
Shiiiiiiiiiiiiitttttt!!!!!!!!
Okay… That’s 4 tries we missed with only 5 metres to go and a knock on/fumble.
Another try butchered cos a lock is catching the ball ahead of checking. Tonight is amateur night.
what was that, 6 man overlap and they fluff it…..
So Bashford and Edwards are the bad apples.
Viljoen is off replaced by Joubert, Bosman at 10
Odwa try
Sharks 20 – 29 Cheetahs
62 min
Immediately after the try, we concede an easy penalty. We need 10 points to win! Can we do it?
Edit: Never mind… We concede a drop goal after another poor try to catch a high ball…
Scheepers miss a PK
Sharks 20 – 32 Cheetahs
65 min
Second Sias dropgoal
Odwa try…. TMO….. try awarded……..
I crap on Odwa and he scores 2 tries… Here it goes:
Ludik, Jordaan, Bosman, Sithole, Joubert, McLeod, Daniel, Deysel, Botes, Bresler, Marais, Herbst, Hadebe and Chadwick are crap!!!
(Now one of them will score)
Sharks 27 – 32 Cheetahs
67 min
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 78) : I don’t agree…. but I get the idea 🙂
Cheetahs over, but held up….
good defense Sharks….
That was good play…
Bosman is having a great time at 10
aaahhhhh oooohooo aahhhha and it scored
geez they really wanted to mess that one too…..
Bosman try
Sharks 34 – 32 Cheetahs
77 min
Yeeeeeessssss!!!!!
Penalty to the Sharks……..
Come on Sharks…. 2 min
Advantage Sharks……
Penalty…. less than 1 min….
And there it is, in the end…. 33 seconds to go, penalty in the Cheetahs half. We have to win this now!
Sharks take the ball in hand…. kick it out and They WIN…..
Sharks 34 – 32 Cheetahs
FT this time 🙂
Really chuffed with the BP victory, but man, we really need to improve!
Well done Sharks 😀 Now bloody stop playing like that!
I cannot believe we still won this!!! I just wish Jordaan could have gone all the way in the end!
@Big Fish (Comment 91) :
Considering the fact we are without almost an entire starting line-up, we are doing pretty damn good!
1. Mtawarira
2. Bismarck
3. Jannie
4.
5.
6. Coetzee
7. Alberts
8. Kankowski
9. Michalak
10.Lambie
11.Mvovo
12.F. Steyn
13.Whitehead
14.JP
15.
That’s 12 players of our first choice. On top of that we also lost Skeate and Hargreaves and got Daniel back only this week.
Bossie MOTM
Bosman definitely MoTM… He was all over the place. Clever kicks, line breaks, territory gain, kicking the conversions… Just amazing. Finally he is doing what he was expected to do when he moved to Durban.
Must start Bosman at flyhalf as soon as Timmy is back from injury.
Well, I don’t think Viljoen is bad as a fly-half. His offensive play is better than Bosman’s, but his goalkicking and defense just needs improvement. I just wish we could have Lambie back since he is warming the bench for 80 minutes while Morne Steyn throws wins away for the Boks.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 94) :
Don’t focus just on the result or personnel; consider the style of rugby and execution of gameplan.
If we don’t improve there, expect another barren SR season.
I don’t think our style of rugby was wrong, it was just personal errors that almost cost us today. Not bad decision making or playing the wrong style of rugby.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 100) :
There is a reason that we were better in the 2nd half. Forwards focused more on the rucks, Bosman played more direct at 10 and as a result we were no longer lateral on attack.
Beside that, did you notice the number of ruck infringement s we committed? Just as in the early SR. Commonality was the young tight forwards again. I’m hoping the coaches picked all that up too.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 30) : Where are you going to download the match from? Do you have a link for me?
Was so pissed off yesterday that the link died with nothing else available. No video highlights to be found anywhere today either.
A friend of mine records matches and puts it on his FTP server. Once I have it, I am going to put it in my Dropbox account. If you want, I can give you the URL. I have a shitload of matches stored on my NAS. I just wish I could get my hands on some 2007 Super 14 matches…
@ Big Fish: Our problem were the numerous handling errors on attack. Last week we lost in the second half because we got pulled into the gameplan of the Bulls. This time we kept it tight, put the ball wide in the second half and got away with a win. We just need to stop giving away kickable penalties. We’ve scored more tries than our opponents in recent matches so that’s not the issue. Conceding penalties is what is killing us at the moment. This is caused by inexperienced players on the field but who can blame guys like Kleinhans, Hadebe, Reinach, Gouws and Marais when it’s their first year with the 1st team? All we need is time. However, despite missing 12 players we are still topping the log after 4 rounds. I am damn proud of my Sharks man. We all should be.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 103) : Thanks. That would be much appreciated. I normally watch the games live on livetv4ever.com but with yesterday´s Sky morons episode they also showed the golf.
Yeah, I had the same issue yesterday. Stupid golf tournament… I found another way though. If you want, I will email you a short tutorial how to watch the SuperSport feed online, even when outside of South Africa.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 105) :
Can you email me? LOL
Used to find live feeds quite easy but incredibly unreliable and haven’t even bothered this year. Gutted because it’s tough finding highlights as well.
[email protected]
Cool. I emailed the tutorial how to watch the feeds.
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 107) : Thanks Gouda Shark
I´ll get it from hendrikp, if he´ll be so nice. Otherwise I´ll just let everyone know what a nasty bastard he is. 😉
Just give me your emailaddress and I will send it to you as well
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 109) : [email protected]
Thanks dude!
@TRF_Ezequiel (Comment 109) : is this the Supersport Live Decoder thing?