Paul Anthony’s Sharks under 19 side suffered an agonising loss at home to the Leopards on Saturday afternoon, conceding a late try to go down 37-40 in a high-scoring game.
Plenty of lessons will have been learned; over the past few weeks, we’ve seen some amazing comebacks from these boys and despite another slow start, they again turned it on during the middle stages of the game to race away to a seemingly unassailable lead. Getting ahead is one thing – staying ahead until the final whistle is quite another, though and a fair amount of credit must go to the Leopards for pulling off their own Houdini act in this game.
Trailing 3-11 after 20 minutes, centre Wayno Visagie started the scoring for the Sharks, with hooker Brad Roberts and powerful winger S’bu Nkosi following suit. Holding a healthy 22-11 lead at the break, the Sharks looked all set for the first victory of their campaign; a Leopards try after the break was cancelled out by Nkosi’s second and with just over a quarter of the match remaining, the wiin looked to be in the bag.
Two quick tries to the visitors changed the complexion entirely, though – had it not been for some wayward kicking by Leopards flyhalf Siyabonga Masuku, the lead would have been entirely lost at that stage, but an earlier Tristan Tedder penalty saw the Sharks clinging to a slender 4-point lead, extended further via an unconverted try to exciting fullback Morne Joubert. Again, looking reasonably comfortable with a 9-point buffer, the Sharks managed to concede twice more in the closing ten minutes, with Leopards replacement Henry Searle scoring three minutes from time to finally hand his side the lead.
While the final result was disappointing, there were some great individual performances from the young men in black, with Nkosi and Joubert, in particular, standing out as real talents to keep an eye on for the future.
Sharks 37 (22). Tries: Alwayno Visagie, Bradley Roberts, Morne Joubert, S’busiso Nkosi (2). Conversions: Tristan Tedder (3). Penalties: Tedder (2).
Leopards 40 (11). Tries: Barend Janse van Rensburg, Bhekisa Shongwe, Henry Searle, Siyabonga Masuku, Tapiwa Mafura, Zweli Silaule. Conversions: Siyabonga Masuku (2). Penalty: Masuki. Drop Goal: Masuku.
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If these boys can just get that ‘don’t let your guard down’ part right they’ll go far.
So these school boys that we sign for u19s dont seem to be as good as we believe. Worrying signs for future years. Im going to save these results and articles for when someone asks why we arent playing the youngsters in super rugby…
@SheldonK (Comment 2) : seems to be a rather big spread in that squad (as always)… remember that only about a 3rd of them are contracted players.
This isn’t brave .
Caitlyn Jenner,she’s brave.
Lol.
@VinChainSaw (Comment 4) : Caitlyn aint brave, business is business. The one that goes out with her will be the brave one.
@robdylan (Comment 3) : I always get the impression we arent really sure who to play in our under19 side. I know we only contract a few and remainder come from club/school sides and the academy. Surely having a run in the u19s would attract more of our craven week better players to stay in kzn?
@VinChainSaw (Comment 4) : little bit too much Freudian info there,
@VinChainSaw (Comment 4) : Lol
@Salmonoid the Subtle (Comment 5) : Double lol
@Salmonoid the Subtle (Comment 5) : hahaha ja boet!!!!
@SheldonK (Comment 6) : ja, you’d think so.
With our Academy setup there should be absolutely no reason why our under19’s could lose to the Leopards,I can sort of rationalise a loss to the Bulls and the W.P but how can we be attracting inferior talent to the Leopards.
That Academy used to be one of the best in the World.
@SheldonK (Comment 6) : Apparently only the brave stay. The rest go elsewhere.
@The hound (Comment 11) : Only about 10% of the academy are recruited and are on bursaries. The remainder are fully paid up students much like any other university, doesnt mean they are particularly good. Hans Scriba also no longer involved at the academy.
@SheldonK (Comment 13) : I know he left,and you can see it in these results.
@The hound (Comment 14) : As they say, cant hide from results column
Tristan Tedder is another name that I would remember for the future, he is a great player and performed well on the day. This result was poor and not what you would expect from a Sharks side against the Leopards. Having said that, there are positives, in fact, they could have smashed the Leopards, truth be told, they just seem to lose concentration when getting into the lead.
It may not seem it now, but I think these guys are going to wake up and get the results soon – if they can beat EP next week, they will go from strength to strength
@Salmonoid the Subtle (Comment 5) :
Ahahahahahahaha.
It takes all types to make the world go round, i suppose!
@VinChainSaw (Comment 4) :
Not a great result…but it does look as if some of the individuals are worth a real look further down the line…
@robdylan (Comment 3) : Rob, this article was much more positive than it sounded like it was going to be in the u21 write-up!
@pastorshark (Comment 20) : ja I also expected something close to “close down the building and lock the doors nothing is going on there……….” were as it sounds more like conditioning problems?!?!
@Vonno13 (Comment 16) : Good luck against EP u19s, should be a good one
@pastorshark (Comment 20) : I decided somebody had to try be positive around here. May as well be me.