Bulls face a case of deja vu
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The Bulls will be left feeling like they have been here before after a 41-13 drubbing at the hand of the Lions with the same problems from Super Rugby creeping into their Currie Cup campaign.
Through out the build up to the opening round, Bulls coach Frans Ludeke made mention that he was aware of the Lions powerful scrum and that he would be targeting them with his own counteractant.
The Lions once again demonstrated why they were so highly rated in the scrums where, Ludeke admitted, they had the Bulls' number.
"It is definitely not the result we wanted in a season opener and it is really disappointing. We were down 23-3 at half-time and gave them some soft tries.
"We coughed the ball up and that intercept try was costly," Ludeke said.
"We came back in the second half and, at 23-13, we were almost back into it but we again lost the ball in contact situations.
A theme through out the Bulls' Super Rugby campaign was their inability to protect the breakdown and to turn balls over with a specialist fetcher.
This problem seemed to reemerge against the lions even with the return of captain and breakdown exponent Deon Stegmann.
"The main thing is our inability to keep the ball and build pressure but we gave them a lot of opportunities from broken field – that is their game, so we were playing into their hands."
While the Lions attacked the gaps, the Bulls persistently went for contact and it was no wonder they lost the ball in contact.
Ludeke said he was still proud of his charges for the way they bounced back from a 20-point deficit in the first half, but chasing the score made it difficult to truly get back into the game.
"That was a mountain to climb and I thought the team showed character," he said.
"The basics cost us tonight, our scrum wasn't good enough tonight, we gave away penalties there and we didn't keep the ball in contact situations. Those are things you can fix."
The Bulls have been aware of their frailties in the scrum and at the breakdown throughout the Super Rugby campaign, it now remains to be seen whether Ludeke can turn things around when they face off against Western Province in Cape Town this coming weekend.
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