Gary Gold has confirmed that Friday night’s friendly against the Lions in Maritzburg will see a large group of players afforded game time, with the coach set to change his team entirely at half time.
“Most guys will get 40 minutes,” said Gold yesterday, “so you’ll see us rotate at half time. We hopefully won’t have chopping and changing but will do a clean swap over, so you’ll get to see a guy play a full 40 minutes.”
With nearly half of the squad of the squad representing the Sharks for the first time in Currie Cup, Gold admitted that a large focus of last week’s camp on the South Coast was to ensure cohesion. “There’s been a really big clean out and we’ve had to do a lot of work on that. A lot of guys haven’t met each other before and the week was less about or players and playing styles and more about what we want to be about and what we want to produce.”
“forgetting about playing styles – and all of that – the issue is about the hunger and the desire. All I really want Sharks supporters to see is that this is a team that comes out with that hunger and desire. We’ve seen it again this year with the Lions – they were given absolutely no chance in Super Rugby but they came out of it with credibility because of the way they played the game. That’s all I want us to do, is to play to 100% of our potential 100% of the time. Then, I think, with this group of players we should win a lot more games than we lose; if we win it, we win it and if we don’t, we don’t, but that is the minimum requirement.
“I’m trying to stay away from buzzwords here, but we have to play with that intensity – that people go ‘jeez, these guys want to play and they want to play for this jersey’. That’s what I can control.”
Gold confirmed that a captain will be announced next week, with Jean Deysel and Marco Wentzel the most obvious candidates. He also confirmed that Pieter-Steph du Toit will play on Friday, saying “I don’t know what SARU’s plan is, but our plan is that he’s currently contracted to us and we’re going to play him as long as he’s with us. I’m really excited to have him back.”
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Warm up games are not where we want to see it. We want to see it when we play Griquas or Pumas in that crucial game and somehow never pitch up (no disrespect to either teams)
@ebenp (Comment 1) : I think you’ve misunderstood what he said. He’s talking about what he wants from the Sharks overall in the competition, not just in the warm up game.
I would have thought that was rather obvious.
Wish the game was being broadcast. Ek is so vrek nuuskierig.
@robdylan (Comment 2) : This article is about warm up game…”..all I want to see is the hunger..”… we all on same side here. But obvious we as fans want to see it when it matters… in past we have not always seen the hunger we expect
Is it just me, or does any one else here have mixed feelings about PSDT playing? I mean, it’s like breaking up with your girlfriend, but then still staying in the same house because the other person an still contribute by buying groceries or whatever. Just go already. 😐
@Another Nick (Comment 5) : first hand experience?
ja, must be instruction form Saru to test the knee out. no benefit to Sharks unless he does not make the RWC squad and can play entire CC
@ Another Nick; ja it does feel kind of hinkey. But he’ll be on his bike soon enough. It’s been ages since I was eager to watch a Sharks game, I think it was actually the Toulon game at the beginning of the year that got me excited. Hopefully the passion Gary spoke about will give us all a buzz to want to watch the games
@Another Nick (Comment 5) : Slow painful with lots of akward silences. Besides all we are doing is once again helping him for free. Help back to form so you can join the boks? Sure help back to form so you can go play for wp afterwards? Sure.
@Another Nick (Comment 5) : What I’m pissed off about is that we are still paying for his rehab. 🙄
@Kabouter (Comment 6) : Lol, perhaps! 😉 @SeanJeff (Comment 7) : @coolfusion (Comment 8) : @Ben (Comment 9) : Well this is exactly what I’m talking about. But hey, we’re just the supporters! We don’t get to share the locker room. I just struggle to find the reasoning behind this.. 😕
@vanmartin (Comment 3) : Maybe it’s better not to know…don’t want to start the CC season on a negative, ignorance is bliss
@Ben (Comment 9) : Apparently we broke him….not sure how we broke something that never seems fixed, if he was a product from Game, I’d have been all over hellopeter 😈
@FireTheLooser (Comment 12) : Ja! Pay back our money! 😆
”A lot of guys haven’t met each other before and the week was less about or players and playing styles and more about what we want to be about and what we want to produce.”
Doesn’t anyone else find this a bizarre statement.
How can we arrive at this time of the season,and a lot of guys haven’t met each other yet.
This sort of ranks for me in the”sorry but I forgot to tell the coaches to teach the super rugby players defence.”
”jeez, these guys want to play and they want to play for this jersey’’another banal statement you’d expect from a junior school coach.
Any guy being paid a professional rugby players salary who doesn’t want to play,and especially for this jersey should get his arse kicked out of the province.
Sorry guys this coach just doesn’t do it for me.
.
@The hound (Comment 14) : I’ll give him this CC season to show what he’s worth…but my patience is wearing thin with all things South African rugby. 😕
@FireTheLooser (Comment 11) : Fair point 😀
I like what the Coach is saying here about ensuring that the players come out with intensity and desire to play, as supporters this is definitely something we want to see.
The proof of the pudding will be in whether we actually see the pre-season talk actually playing itself out on the field during the season.
@Another Nick (Comment 13) : LMAO!!!! Ja geez with him, Hoffmann and Alberts gone what is the medical staff going to do?!?!
@JD (Comment 18) : We still have Paul Jordaan on our books. 😈
@stevovo (Comment 17) : yeh look hate to say it but ive heard that speech before with very little on field action
@JD (Comment 18) : This is just spitballing but here’s what I think the medical staff should do with their tons of pending free time:
1. Sequence Marcell Coetzees genome (the challenge here will be to come up with a way to draw his blood. Conventional needles will obviously break)
2. Create a clone army of baby Marcell Coetzee’s using his genome (we’ll need to also create a super nanny race to take care of said babies)
3. In 18 year’s time fire the medical team. They’re no longer necessary (Marcell Coetzee does not get injured, he just gives others some game time. He’s nice like that)
4. Split the army into u19, u21, Impi, Vodacom Cup, Currie Cup & Super Rugby teams. Win all the competitions with perfect seasons.
5. A team of made up entirely of Marcells is chosen for the Boks. They win every international friendly and competition known to man. They attain the no.1 ranking and win the World Cup.
6. The Bok coaching team are eventually deemed surplus to requirements as Team Marcell ushers in a golden era of Sharks and Bok rugby.
7. Team Marcell eventually gets bored and infiltrate every sporting code known to man and win them all.
8. All sports are eventually considered boring as Team Marcell makes a clean sweep of everything.
9. Team Marcell goes on to win all reality TV shows and people start switching off TVs as a result and see the sun for the first time in years.
10. The idea of sovereign nations crumbles as competition between countries fade away, people have nothing left to watch either and start interacting again.
11. World unity and peace on earth. Thanks Marcell Coetzee!!
@vanmartin (Comment 21) : How is it that you have not yet been elected as supreme leader of the Sharks board, SARU and the IRB!?
@Culling Song (Comment 22) : I don’t mountain bike 🙁
@vanmartin (Comment 23) : 😆
Heading had me slightly confused.
Thought you predict they’ll both lose by 40 + lol !
@Original Pierre (Comment 25) : eish.
@vanmartin (Comment 21) : I take it you like Marcell? 😈
@JD (Comment 27) : Like is such a weak word JD. Best way to describe it is Marcell is the antithesis to someone like Culling Song’s Conrad Hoffman. I fixate but in a almost completely healthy, non restraining order sort of way.
@vanmartin (Comment 28) : somehow I see a restraining order in someone’s future!!!!!! hahaha 😈
@vanmartin (Comment 28) : I’m sorry, I take offense at that, I am in no way fixated on Conrad Hoffman, that #%^&* hopeless, fast-as-#[email protected]%^-continental-drift, courageous-as-a-wet-&^@#$%^-sponge, no-good defiler-of-Sharks-jerseys… er, sorry, what were we talking about again? Got a bit sidetracked there…
@vanmartin (Comment 23) : 😆
@Culling Song (Comment 30) : 😆
@The hound (Comment 14) : agreed,what rubbish is this,get real,clueless
@benji (Comment 33) : what a mess
Gary Gold is a used car salesman, a talker, says all the right things bit so far in hos career there has been no substance whatsoever to back up the words.
@Orlok Tsubodai (Comment 35) :worse mate he is an undertaker