Another bonus for 'windswept' Roux
FNB Maties head coach Chean Roux was obviously pleased with his team’s fourth successive bonus point victory in the 2010 Varsity Cup – despite, once again, having to deal with inclement weather conditions.
The Maties, playing in windy conditions in Stellenbosch on Monday night, turned 14-15 down against FNB Shimlas at half-time – but ended up winning 31-15 and, also, securing that four-try bonus point in the process.
“It seems the elements are following us everywhere,” Roux told varsitycup.co.za with a chuckle.
“We had strong wind in our opening game [against NMMU] in PE… it rained pretty hard last week [against UJ] and I’m not sure where that wind came from on Monday night.
“Given the strong wind, I wasn’t too worried about things at half-time, as I knew that if we could pin them down in their half we could capitalise on their mistakes and build up a lead. The difference, however, was that we got two tries in the first half, that set us up nicely.”
All in all, Roux – who is something of a perfectionist – declared himself “pleased” with his team’s performance against the Men from Bloemfontein, despite leaking two tries in the first half.
“I was actually pleased with our defence,” said the Maties boss. “I’ve watched the video and even though they scored twice, it wasn’t due to technical lapses in our defence – one try, for instance, came from a lucky bounce (for them).
“This is a quality Shimlas side, they had two SA Under-20 players and some Vodacom Cup guys too, (and) as I told the guys afterwards you can’t win every game by 40 points.”
Quite incredibly, Stellenbosch – the winners of this competition for the past two seasons – have secured four-try bonus points in every match thus far.
Roux, however, still sees those extra points as a “bonus”.
He concluded: “I’ve always told my guys not to worry about the bonus point.
“Ask any of the guys in my team, I’ve always said, ‘Secure the win first… then worry about the bonus point in injury-time’. Amazingly, we did just that against UJ and Shimlas and that after struggling last year to pick up those four-try bonuses.”
Meanwhile, Roux revealed that his star inside centre, Dabeon Draghoender, would miss the rest of the 2010 Varsity Cup with a knee injury, whilst outside centre Stokkies Hanekom picked up a knee injury on Monday and will definitely not play against Tukkies on Monday, March 1.
But the season-ending loss of Draghoender aside, the Maties coach was very impressed with the performance of his new No.12, Stephan van der Merwe.
“I suspected that Shimlas would attack Stephan’s channel, which they did, but he coped very well and his distribution was also good on the night,” said Roux.
