Burger Odendaal makes bumping and crashing look cool again

With South African rugby all obsessed about attacking rugby nowadays, it’s not cool currently for a backline player to be a bumper car.

After all, if you’re one, you’re probably a boring and even limited player.

Burger Odendaal doesn’t care.

Also read: Bulls desperately hope Boom Prinsloo pulls a ‘Lappies’

If anything, the Bulls inside centre believes crashing into defenders is essential.

“In any team, the No 12 has a big role in getting his forwards on the front foot,” said Odendaal on Wednesday.

“To be honest, running into opponents comes rather naturally for me. I played flyhalf at school, so I always took contact.”

Judging by his performances in this year’s Super Rugby campaign, the 24-year-old from Krugersdorp is hardly a one-trick pony.

Yes, he’s been bumping off defenders like the Lions’ Rohan Janse van Rensburg but he’s also been pretty good at finding space.

“I’ve been trying to keep a balance this season. It’s all good and well for sides to try and find space on the field but it’s not always possible. Some defences are really tight,” said Odendaal.

“Sometimes you need to crash before you can find space. But it’s not always easy to decide when to do what. You only have a second or two. It’s important to be varied.”

One of the features of the Bulls’ iffy campaign has been coach Nollis Marais’ strategy of rotating his centre combinations.

Not surprising when you have Springboks Jesse Kriel and Jan Serfontein in your group.

What people didn’t foresee is that those two would be the men rotated and not Odendaal.

He’s been Marais’ go-to guy this season.

It’s an interesting dynamic because conventional wisdom would tell two things in this regard.

Firstly, centre combinations need to gel over a period of time to be effective.

And, of course, high-profile players like Serfontein and Kriel don’t like being rotated.

Odendaal says that doesn’t apply in this case.

“When I came to the Bulls, Jan, (the injured) Dries Swanepoel and I played in the same age group. It was always a difficult thing when teams had to be picked with us three present,” he said.

“It’s made it easier for us to accept a rotation policy at senior level. What also helped is that we didn’t come into the system with a whole bunch of senior guys still playing. That’s when you start creeping into your shell. In our situation, we’re a group of young players and we have the freedom to go all out. We relish the competition.”

At the moment, Odendaal is winning that competition at Loftus … and maybe even at Springbok level too.

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