‘We just weren’t good enough’: Lions flanker Jaco Kriel

Lions stalwart Jaco Kriel was very hard on himself and his teammates after they put in a lacklustre and disappointing performance, going down 34-10 to the Bulls in their United Rugby Championship match over the weekend.

The Lions defence was shown up once again, as it had been the week before by the Sharks, but the home side were unable to hit back and stay in the game as they had a week earlier, and were instead bullied out of the game by the Bulls.

“Defence is something we addressed this week, especially after the Sharks game. We felt that our transition from attack to defence wasn’t good enough. Today as well, I believe we just had a lack of intent,” explained Kriel.

“We are grateful to be here and it just seemed like the guys took it for granted, so every single one of us is going to have a hard look at ourselves and we must realise it’s a huge privilege to be here. It’s not ideal to play like we did, but the positive is it’s fixable.”

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The breakdown was also an area of concern for the Lions, with the Bulls back three of Marcell Coetzee, Arno Botha and Elrigh Louw, along with hooker Johan Grobbelaar, all disrupting their progress.

“We knew that Marcell, Johan, Arno and Elrigh are all hard on the ball, so our focus the whole week was on body height and getting in early, and as I said, the intent wasn’t there from the boys,” said Kriel.

“We didn’t execute what we had planned during the week, and the breakdown was one of them. Our body height was bad, our reactions were bad, and we just weren’t good enough.

“Every time we had an opportunity in the Bulls half we just gave the ball away again and let them off.”

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The Lions now have a lot of work to do in the week before they cross the Jukskei to face the Bulls again, this time at their fortress Loftus, and the visitors will need to put in a massively improved performance if they want to have any chance of a positive result.

“The positive is there is a lot of fixing to do, so we can work nice and hard this week,” said Lions coach Ivan van Rooyen.

“Reflection is one thing and executing the plan is another, so those are two areas we will work really hard on.

“We have to just get back on the horse. Having the next opportunity against the same team is probably the best opportunity.”