Mapoe on playing three matches a week: ‘We must get used to it’

The Bulls, fresh off an impressive win against Irish side Munster, are next up against Wales outfit Scarlets in the United Rugby Championship this weekend – and they’re expecting a tough challenge despite the visitors coming unstuck against the Sharks last weekend.

Complicating matters for the Bulls is some of their most senior players, including Lionel Mapoe, are in action in the Currie Cup on Wednesday as well – two days before the URC match at Loftus against Scarlets.

“That is what we sportsmen do for a living, so it is important that our bodies hold,” said Mapoe on the load of having to play in more than one competition per week.

“That’s the thing, you get these guys overseas playing more than 200 or 300 games for their clubs and you wonder where these guys rack up all these games, and this is exactly how it goes.

“As South Africans we need to start getting used to playing weekday and weekend games. It is also something that will leave the onus on us to take care of our bodies.”

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Scarlets, despite going down to the Sharks, put up a good fight in Durban and after an extra week in South Africa, are expected to be more familiar with conditions.

“There is no easy game in the URC. They are obviously missing a few players to international games, but we are going to have to be at our best on the day,” said Mapoe.

“They’ve been here for over a week now and will prepare well for us.

“This, for us, will also be a game we want to win, a game that is very important for our campaign.”

Mapoe added the Bulls would have to be better switched on than they were against Munster, who staged a big fightback in the second half last weekend.

“In the Munster game we were obviously happy with the result, but not entirely happy with the overall game. We knew we needed to put them away,” Mapoe reflected.

“I think we let ourselves down, especially in that second half. We sort of went into a period where we tried not to lose the game instead of playing our normal game, but those are work-ons we will need to go through.

“Obviously, the overseas teams coming this side will always find it difficult to play here at high intensity for 80 minutes. Credit to Munster, they did it pretty well to keep themselves in the game. Where we felt we could have done better, we found ourselves taking the foot off the pedal in that second half.”

The match on Friday kicks off at 7.10pm.