Cheetahs prepared for kicking barrage against Cardiff

The Cheetahs are gearing up to receive for a kicking barrage from Cardiff when the two teams battle it out in their Challenge Cup encounter at Arms Park in Wales on Saturday night (kick-off 10pm).

The Free State side almost got their campaign off to a winning start during an entertaining opening match against Perpignan in Amsterdam, which is where they are based for their home games, but ended with a 20-all draw after the visitors slotted an 80^th minute penalty.

They will thus be eager to pick up an upset win over Cardiff, who also went down in their opener against Lyon in France, but will face a stiff challenge against the slightly favoured hosts, especially with unpredictable weather conditions expected.

“At the end of the day the game (against Perpignan) came down to three key moments. Three soft tries that we let in from our side. So our defence and using the opportunities that we get better is a big focus for us this weekend,” said Cheetahs coach Izak van der Westhuizen.

“That’s the one thing we’ve learnt over the past couple of weeks is that the weather changes every day. We are expecting a bit more of a kicking game from their side and we have been preparing for that all week.”

Few changes

Van Der Westhuizen admitted that the team would not be making any drastic changes to the starting 15 that ran out against Perpignan, with just two being made for the clash with Cardiff as they look to build up some momentum.

“We are only making two changes to the team. It is pretty much a horses for courses type of selection in what we are expecting (from Cardiff) and how we want to play. So there are just two minor tactical changes for the weekend,” said Van Der Westhuizen.

After a solid forward performance in their draw against Perpignan, Cheetahs loose forward Gideon van der Merwe admitted it was a part of their game they take pride in and that they were aiming to put in another big shift against Cardiff.

“We pride ourselves on our forward pack. The standards are high and we always know we have to bring our A game. It’s nice to see that we can still dominate up front in Europe and we will try keep that going,” said Van Der Merwe.

“We were quite good at their (Perpignan’s) breakdowns, but we were bad at our own breakdowns. We need to keep working on our own defensive breakdowns, which we have been focusing on this week. So we are happy with our defensive breakdowns but need to work on our attacking ones.”