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Sharks suffer Siya Kolisi injury blow in tense draw with Munster

By PA
Siya Kolisi of Cell C Sharks during the United Rugby Championship match between Cell C Sharks and Leinster at Hollywoodbets Kings Park Stadium in Durban, South Africa. (Photo By Harry Murphy/Sportsfile via Getty Images)

Siya Kolisi’s Kings Park send-off was marred by a Sharks collapse and personal disappointment after he limped off early in the 22-22 draw with Munster in the United Rugby Championship.

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Kolisi, who will join Racing 92 after the World Cup, watched all but eight minutes of the draw from the stands after suffering a significant injury to his right knee, incurred during a tackle by Calvin Nash.

The second half will have been a hard watch for the South Africa captain as having seen the Sharks ease to a 22-3 lead, Munster then staged a fightback ignited by a penalty try.

Nash and Conor Murray added further tries and Munster staged a final assault that ended with them being held up over the line in overtime but the draw was enough to lift them above the Bulls into fifth place.

Once Kolisi had been patched up for an aborted attempt at playing on, a short-range maul allowed Bongi Mbonambi to peel free on the blindside to touch down.

The Sharks added a contentious second when Werner Kok rolled his way over the whitewash but the try was approved by the TMO.

For all their success in finding the line, the Durban-based team were losing key players at a worrying rate as fly-half Curwin Bosch followed Kolisi into the stands, also with a knee injury.

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Unperturbed, the Sharks kept on coming with number eight Sikhumbuzo Notshe the next to capitalise on a line-out maul following a strong carry by Mbonambi.

With wing Shane Daly in the sin-bin, Munster were up against it and they entered half-time 19-3 down without firing a shot.

Their outlook soon improved when replacement wing Aphelele Fassi was sin-binned for offside, in the process conceding a penalty try that offered a glimmer of hope.

Munster quickly saw the extra man wiped out when captain Peter O’Mahony was shown a yellow card for escalating a scuffle.

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But an opportunist try by Nash tilted the game on its axis and when Murray went over at the end of a maul for a try converted by Ben Healy, the score was level at 22-22.

Munster poured forward in the closing stages but could not finish the job.

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Tom 54 minutes ago
England player ratings vs South Africa | 2024 Autumn Nations Series

That 2019 performance was literally the peak in attacking rugby under Eddie. If you thought that was underwhelming, the rest of it was garbage.


I totally get what you're saying and England don't need or have any God given right to the best coaches in the world... But I actually think the coaches we do have are quite poor and for the richest union in the world, that's not good enough. 


England are competitive for sure but with the talent pool up here and the funds available, we should be in the top 3. At the very least we should be winning six nations titles on a semi-regular basis. If Ireland can, England definitely should.


England's attack coach (Richard Wigglesworth) is Borthwick's mate from his playing days at Saracens, who he brought to Leicester with him when he became coach. Wigglesworth was a 9 who had no running or passing game, but was the best box kicker in the business. He has no credentials to be an attack coach and I've seen nothing to prove otherwise. Aside from Marcus Smith’s individual brilliance, our collective attack has looked very uninspiring.

 

England's defence coach (Joe El-Abd) is Borthwick's housemate from uni, who has never been employed as a defence coach before. He's doing the job part time while he's still the head coach of a team in the second division of French rugby who have an awful defensive record. England's defence has gone from being brutally efficient under Felix Jones to as leaky as a colander almost overnight.


If Borthwick brings in a new attack and defence coach then I'll absolutely get behind him but his current coaches seem to be the product of nepotism. He's brought in people he's comfortable with because he lacks confidence as an international head coach and they aren't good enough for international rugby.


England are competitive because they do some things really well, mostly they front up physically, make a lot of big hits, have a solid kicking game, a good lineout, good maul, Marcus Smith and some solid forwards. A lot of what we do well I would ascribe to Borthwick personally. I don't think he's a bad coach, I think he lacks imagination and is overly risk averse. He needs coaches who will bring a point of difference.


I guess my point is, yes England are competitive, but we’re not aiming for competitive and I honestly don't believe this coaching setup has what it takes to make us any better than competitive.


On the plus side it looks like we have an amazing crop of young players coming through. Some of them who won the u20 world cup played for England A against Australia A on the weekend and looked incredible... Check out the highlights on youtube.

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