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Jake White: 'There’s one thing Leinster taught me tonight'
By Rugby365
Jake White, the Bulls’ Director of Rugby, said his side was not in pieces after their disappointing loss at the hands of Leinster in their United Rugby Championship clash at the RDS Arena in Dublin this past Friday.
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Instead, he reminded all that his team was still second on the log with a host of big guns waiting for them in the next month.
“We are not in pieces,” White said emphatically.
“We are traveling back, we are second on the log, we played against a team that beats most teams nine out of ten times, I think nine and a half times out of ten times.
“We are not going to get down on ourselves. We didn’t win today and we’ve got to be humble about it.
“It’s not doom and gloom. This is a benchmark of where the clubs wants to be. It takes years and years of work.”
White said if one had to look at the history of Leinster, they are a club that built themselves up over time.
“What we do need is time. This hasn’t happened overnight for Leinster.
“Look at that bench, it reminds me of that Springbok bench when you just bring on more internationals, and not just any internationals, proper internationals.
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“We are going to have to learn from that, I am not talking about rugby learning, also just learning as a club of how we can get to those heights.”
Asked what he thought the role of former Springbok coach Jacques Nienaber has been on quality of Leinster rugby, White said it was a very clever move of their head coach Leo Cullen to bring in someone with the inside knowledge of South African rugby.
“Leinster hasn’t gone from being average to now becoming the real deal overnight. I mean, they have been winning 95% of their games the last couple of years.
“All Jacques will do I’m sure is top up on that 95%. I just think it’s a very astute move by Leo [Cullen],to bring in a chap of the intricacies of what works for the Springboks,” White said.
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“They haven’t won tournaments, but to be fair, there aren’t a lot of teams that can brag about beating Leinster over the last couple of seasons.”
White also refereed to the quality of Leinster’s replacements compared to the young guns of the Bulls.
“One of the things that do work is a bench of Malcolm Marx and those sort of guys, RG Snyman and you guys [Leinster] did it to us tonight.
“They were far more experienced than the group I could put on.
“It’s a very different team to the one we played last time, it’s two years older. And that’s why I say we need time.
“There’s one thing Leinster taught me tonight, and again reaffirmed, is the ability for them to go from defence into the attack, it was phenomenal.
“Every time we made a mistake they punished us.
“Every time they transitioned from a bad kick or a turn-over ball, they literally got away with points.”
White was adamant that his side will bounce back – they just had to learn from the mistakes and build on the experience of playing these big teams.
“We will be better.
“There’s a lot of learnings.
“It’s probably a good lesson for us to play Leinster before we play Lyon in a knock-out game because the next week, if we get through, we play the winner of Northampton and Munster.
“And that’s not going to be easy. And the following week we play Munster again in the URC.
“So literally the next month is not going to be any different to what we experienced today in terms of intensity, in terms of accuracy, in terms of pressure. So those are the lessons that we will have to put into our planning.”
I know the Bulls will definitely take the lessons from Leinster & build on it. They were the most successful SA team in super rugby as they won the championship 3 times. Their position on the log suggests that they are on the right path but it will take few years before they catch up with the best teams from the NH.
Well said, Jake. No excuses, no breast-beating, just a humble acknowledgement that the Bulls came last. And I’d rather that inexperience is dealt with by Jake than have it passed on to Rassie.